


The Dream of Possibility

by littlemandragora



Series: The Dream of A Raven [1]
Category: Cyberpunk 2077 (Video Game), Wiedźmin | The Witcher (Video Game), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types, Wiedźmin | The Witcher Series - Andrzej Sapkowski
Genre: "Shitty two crown romance", Alternate Universe, Cyberpunkcrossover, DifferentPOVs, F/M, Fluff and Smut, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Identity Issues, Multipath, Smut, Timeandspacetravel, Traumateaminternational, Twisted and Fluffy Feelings, descriptionofdepression, love you love you yen XD, mentionofdeath, mentionofdrugabuse, whenRegisstopsbeingknowitall
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-30
Updated: 2019-03-07
Packaged: 2019-09-02 04:24:03
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 12
Words: 30,446
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16779529
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/littlemandragora/pseuds/littlemandragora
Summary: When creatures of the past meets one from the future. When in an alternative universe, there was one more member in the hansa.  Whose hands held the strings of our destiny?AU reimagining the search for Ciri with one more hansa member. Soft pairing this OC with Regis, in effort to create another possibility for him to have a peaceful life like he deserves, but with a female OC. I want to see what could happen with Regis when he meets a human who actually knows things Regis' not an expert on XDFor Regis x OC fluff + smut go to chapter 5,6,7, 10, 11, 12For Regis x Dettlaff go to chapter 9





	1. A Midsummer Night's Dream

**Author's Note:**

> I hope the crossover is not too outrageous :p I'm obsessed with the books and lore, but also a big fan of CDPR (even though there's imperfection in their character redesign; at least they brought back our Regis <3<3<3). I really put my hopes up for the Cyberpunk game and the other day I just had this vague shape of a character popped up in my head. I know the witcher world and cyberpunk don't seem to mix in the first glance, but I ask you to sit through because mostly it's still the witcher world, and I try my best to bring our beloved characters alive for a *slightly different adventure.
> 
> Please please please. If anyone’s kind enough to want to help me and go over my writings, I would so love to have a witcher fan beta reader. It’s my first time writing fan fic and honestly it’s been years since I actually wrote fictions, also English is not my first language. So, I would really appreciate any suggestions on anything :3
> 
> This is a derivative work from Andrzej Sapkowski’s Witcher Saga, dedicated to the memories he and his wonderfully crafted characters had brought about. I do not owe any commercial rights to the titled work.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Here enters the 7th member.
> 
> For those who are not familiar with the books (they're so good tho wink wink), on Geralt's way to find Ciri and later Yennefer, his bard friend Dandelion insisted to go with him, then archer Milva joined. When they were going towards the Yaruga river from Brokilon, they met Zoltan Chivay and his company and travelled together. Then they met Regis around Fen Carn, an ancient elven cemetery. The whole company was invited by Regis to spend the night in his little shack, and this is where the story started in this chapter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I made up the references from Condwiramus Tilly to drop hints, and yes it is a reference to the The Interpretations of Dreams in our world:) I'm not sure how much game plot and reference I'm really going to use, and I haven't decided how eventually this is going end, but I saw that I can't avoid it so I decided to use that quote from game Ciri anyway.  
> I kind of followed [this kaeltale's fanfic ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12614564) name for Regis' ex-lover in this one; my name for her is Lusina Mircalla Justina de Basarab, but she liked to be called Carmilla.

> _‘Phantoms,’ Nimue said not looking at her. ‘Visitors from other dimensions, other levels, other places, other times. Visions that transform one’s life. Transforms your life and your destiny... Without knowing. For them it is... just another place. The wrong place, wrong time. Who knows how many times...’_  
>  _Lady of the Lake, Chapter Seven_  
>  _“People there had metal in their heads, waged war from a distance, using things similar to megascopes. And there were no horses, everyone had their own flying ship instead.”_  
>  Ciri, in 1272, on the Isle of Mists  
>  _In the following pages, I shall demonstrate common techniques by which dreams may be entered, recorded, and interpreted and that upon the application of these methods every dream will show itself to be a senseful structure. But first, allow me to talk of those who do the dreaming and interpreting: oneiromancers._  
>  Condwiramus Tilly, _The Interpretations of Dreams_

Geralt walked towards the cot inside Emiel Regis’ summer abode as the barber-surgeon gestured him to come, carefully avoiding the herbs and roots hanging everywhere.

“How is she?” asked Geralt, looking at the woman lying on bed.

“She’s fine. It’s only pyrexia, commonly known as a fever. I had given her some medicaments, the high temperature should drop before midnight, and other symptoms should go away completely the next day.”

The barber-surgeon went on in an explanatory tone, while pulling a thin blanket over the woman.

“She’s likely going to experience fatigue, I advise to treat that with ample rest and nutrition. Although it would prove to be no quandary, should she want to continue the travel. And if you will forgive my curiosity, this young lady is quite an enigma. I can see she differs somewhat from the other traveling refugees you and your companions have most kindly taken up as a collective responsibility. To be frank, I have tried to discern the strange marks on her right temple and yet arrived to absolutely no conclusion. Is she perhaps an adept from the magic academy? How to adress her?”

Geralt almost sighed visibly as the barber-surgeon’s melodic voice went on and on. He refrained from making any wry remarks regarding his peculiar language choices, and stated in just a few words the woman’s name and how she seemed only have happened to Zoltan Chivay and his company, before they all met up together. The barber-surgeon nodded in a rather wavering amazement and asked for her name again.

“Rana… something. A wordy long name.”

“Not an enchantress? Curious indeed.” The barber-surgeon’s eyes shone against the dim glow of the burning coal inside the potbelly stove, sitting not too far from them, “I don’t believe I have encountered any Northern name as such, but it isn’t exactly following any Nifgaardian traditions either. Am I right to assume she’s quite far from a local?”

“I don’t know if you are right though I assumed the same. She said she came from somewhere ‘far far away’, and did not deign to explain more than that,” Geralt snorted softly, “she said even if she would explain, it’d be just too unbelievable to anyone in this world, and that she’s also terrible at directions, so she has no idea where she came from in relation to this place. But,” he paused, not wanting to continue but did, “but I cannot abandon her for some reasons I’m not yet willing to reveal, in her consideration. I know for certain she poses no threat. For now it does not matter where she’s from.” While they were speaking, the woman lying underneath the blanket twitched and moaned faintly. She seemed to have muttered something, but neither Geralt nor the barber-surgeon was able to understand.

The flap was fluttered open while Milva strode in, and a commotion has been stirred up as conversation started to revolve around the mythical-like mandrake root, of which the expertise of Emiel Regis, the barber-surgeon, also the alchemist, was called upon.

As Regis was getting up from the bedside stool, he felt a cold hand touched his. It seemed that woman, Rana, had gained some consciousness and wanted something. Despite her feeble attempt to (“it’d seem”) grab his hand, it merely felt like a caress.

He looked at her face for a second time, and noticed she opened her eyes slightly. Those eyes, although bleary and unfocused, still managed to take his attention away from everything else for a few seconds.

They are beautiful eyes, unusual even. He had thought Carmilla’s greyish silver eyes were the rarest eyes he’d ever seen, and they were, but these eyes -- “A sight to behold.”

Deep purple and ocean green, with a singe of gold dust whirling in the depth as they turned. _Is it possible?_ He thought. Like cinnamon powder whirling in autumn tea. _Can human have eyes like these?_ But when he gathered his thoughts and really looked at them again, he knew the real reason they caught him off guard—they radiated an eerie, bright, metallic light in the dimness. Ordinary people would probably shudder at such sight, but Regis, after all, was not ordinary.

He looked at her frame underneath the thin blanket and saw a normal young human female, probably lived no longer than 25 years; nothing betrayed even the slightest clue of abnormity. _There’s no doubt she’s human, yet something… a curse? Another witcher?_ ( _No, he had never heard of female witcheress_ ) In something lied a small difference, a difference not yet discovered, and that aroused Regis’ interest: something unbeknownst to him did not come by just every day.

The woman groaned softly again, attempting to turn to her side. A display of rapid eye movements suggested her previous action was only part of the unconscious results to her hazy dream. Regis mused on what the fever might have incited in her sleep, and noticed her short hair slightly tangled up on her forehead because of the sweat. He reached out and brushed the hair away, out of the instinct of _the caretaker_ in him. He felt the warmth exuded from her, the fever and the force of life. Maybe also something else. But he didn’t want to sit on the thoughts. It’s been some time since he touched a human in sleep. And a woman at that…… He felt confusion, withdrew, and readied himself to join the conversation on magic, curses, and mandrake moonshine.

Before he left, he glanced at her once more, at her lips, full and a little chapped from the journeying on foot for days, and indistinct mumblings from her dream. Something about her shook him on the inside. He did not know what and why and how. But he felt it. Something old seemed to have been awakened, and this long-forgotten feeling terrified him a little. He shook away the thought and the feeling before his mind had more chance to further decipher what it was, and was ready to fascinate himself in the ingenuity of Zoltan’s tale, on how to avoid the oh-so-terrible curses from mandrake roots, also called “love apple.” Such avoidance was easy, for what the curse targeted ultimately derived from a non-founded novelty, a source material for passing-times on the dinnertable; some things, however, cannot be avoided so easily.

In the little cottage, warm with strong herbal aroma, alcoholic sweat and nocturnal conversations, Rana dreamed.

In her dream, she was dancing very fast. Swirling and swooshing. A girl danced with her; a girl with pointed ears, dressed up in colors like a cockatiel. The world around them was noisy with shouting and laughing and clapping and stomping. And she danced. In her dream, she felt like a teardrop, drunk in laughter.

When Rana woke up, her fever had receded and it was quiet all around, save for the low mumblings from Dandelion. She made out a few words despite the shaky feeling she still had fresh after a good fever slumber.

Something about destiny, laws, and surprises.

“…… And that, my good host, was how Ciri ended up leaving the witcher’s keep with our noble witcher. I met her, too. You know, I never imagined myself praising children one day, but today’s the day. I mean, tonight is the day. Wait, tonight is the night?......” His voice fell lower and lower until with a small thud it stopped altogether with Dandelion’s head on the ground.

Everyone was fast asleep and the little cottage reeked of alcohol, even the witcher, whom Rana had a feeling she should talk to, about her weird dream. Why? She didn’t know, but somehow she sensed familiarity somewhere.

She sat up and leaned against the wall, feeling a little lightheaded. When she scanned the room, her eyes met with that of the barber-surgeon’s. Two pairs of eyes, both gleaming in the darkness. She thought some sort of explanation was expected, but wasn’t sure what would had been appropriate or sensible. So she said nothing. Perhaps he wanted to ask, or explain, or both. But he didn’t, either. Nobody spoke for what could had been a very long or a very short period of time; Rana wasn’t sure. She was feeling a little lightheaded. That feeling made her voice croak when she finally spoke.

“I had a bad dream.” She felt and heard the dryness in her throat, and was surprised at her own inappropriate frankness. “I don’t know why it’s bad. Nothing categorically bad happened. I just felt so bad. And my head hurts.” Damn, _I sound just like a little girl._ She thought.

The barber-surgeon stood up effortlessly and went outside. He came back very quickly and almost soundlessly ( _or maybe it was?_ ) _,_ now holding a cup in his hand.

“It’s from the spring. I will heat it up now, please wait a little.” He said in a quiet and somewhat apologetic voice. _He sounds kind, too._ She thought. _But somehow I feel annoyed. Why?_

“No. I will take it as is.”

“Your body is still recovering from a severe fever. It is not advisable-- ”

“Just give me water.”

She heard his soft sigh and footsteps, managed to sat up a little bit straighter and held her eyes open a little bit wider. “Thank you.” She told him while taking over the cup, also somewhat apologetically.Maybe slightly less than she was supposed to and much less than she meant to; she was supposed to use the chance to apologize for being rude in her last line. _My “social skills” got rusty._ She observed herself and made a remark, decided to behave more cautiously and be nicer next time.

The water had a sweet taste to it; clear and cool. It sent a small chill to her body and she felt colder but better. Her head was surer and she remembered seeing curiosity in his eyes. _So, we need to take care of that, don’t we. Well, I managed to pass Geralt, I can do it again._

She cleared her throat and said, “I’m not in the habit of leaving questions unanswered unless necessity requires it. But in this case, it’s a little bit more complicated. I know, my eyes don't look very, very normal here, but to explain it, I really have to start with a lot of seemingly unrelated subjects and we’ll end up not doing anything for a few days. So,” She paused, taking in a small sip of moisture for her throat and used the chance to observe the barber-surgeon’s expression.

The barber-surgeon smiled with pursed lips. “You needn’t explain if it’s a personal matter. I believe I hadn’t asked.”

She chuckled faintly, not related to anything he said, but the way he smiled, _what a strange man_ , then, despite herself, she let herself think he was a little _cute_ as well. _What am I doing? Still can’t resist the silver foxes……_

“Your type ask with your eyes, and I happen to see quite well. Anyway, I’m not a witcher, not a monster, not a witch, and I don’t know anything about magic, as I've answered many times to various memebers of the group. I absolutely don’t mean harm to anyone here. These eyes are in good condition and function well, to you, they might look a little bit… hmm, how to put this… unsettling? But they are perfectly normal where I came from. And with all the aforementioned reasons, let’s just leave it as is for now. A small and harmless mystery I promise to resolve eventually. “She paused to finish the water in her cup, but spoke again before the barber-surgeon had a chance to nod. “Besides, I suppose I could ask the same question to you. My eyes do _see_ quite well, you know.”

A not-quite-comfortable silence followed. Seeing the barber-surgeon wasn’t in a hurry to say anything, Rana added, “But I’m not asking either, whether it’s personal or not. We are leaving soon anyway.” She felt a very thin surge of embarrassment washing over her, and, to her surprise, also disappointment.

“Please don’t take offense.” The barber-surgeon spoke softly, “I’m also not in the habit of leaving questions unanswered unless necessity requires it. But in my case, I’m afraid necessity does call for a little bit secrecy here for it would also take time – and not only time – to set the matter straight. But rest assure, I also mean no harm to anyone here. So, a small and harmless mystery I also promise to resolve eventually and, please refrain from mentioning this conversation to the generous company, for I abandoned my initial plan and decided to travel along for safety. I would not like to raise unnecessary concerns if possible.”

Rana looked at him, her head slightly cocked to her left, her neon purple eyes against his black onyxes. Fear? Discomfort? Surprise? Fascination? If she felt anything, her eyes didn’t communicate them. She put down the cup and remained silent. The flap over the door waved weakly but consistently, drawing cool air from outside in small doses, slowly desaturating the sharp, sweet scent of alcohol that had grown vaguely sour with human sweat and other things. After a short while, she nodded, he nodded back with a purse-lipped the smile, she smiled a purse-lipped smile, too, but her replicated smile lacked even feigned sincerity.

The cool air grew cooler and cooler, clearer and clearer. The small cottage started to smell less like a dreamy night in midsummer and more like a chilly beginning of dawn.

“What was in the bitter drink you gave me earlier?” She asked in a strange tone.

“It was a herbal remedy to reduce inflammation caused by an infection in your upper respiratory tract. Its bitterness is likely coming from ingredients such as Nepeta, Parsnips, and honeysuckle. However, I did add a dose of licorice to mediate the…..”

“Thank you.” Rana cut in bluntly, not wanting to waste time on the peculiar medical knowledge that made no sense to her, and decided she already drank the thing anyway and was breathing still, the act was foolish and unnecessary. She changed her voice back into the richer and warmer tone, “I’m sure I wouldn’t be wrong to guess Geralt had paid you for the medicine already? And, if you don’t mind, doctor, we talked this much without me asking your name…” She inserted some worked-up genuineness in the formality in the end, for she really did start to feel a little bad for the deliberate questioning and interrupting. He helped her, after all, regardless of the payment or not. It was not her right to question him on things she couldn’t clear herself off of.

When the barber-surgeon spoke this time, Rana noticed a slight change in his tone. “I am Emiel Regis, not a doctor, merely a barber-surgeon in practice. About the fee, this assumption has to be addressed, unfortunately, as impertinent. For I requested none.” Rana pressed hard her urge to roll her eyes over, an universal sign of contempt, when she heard and saw Geralt groaning with hands on his forehead. Instead, she smiled apologetically, “My bad. Please don’t take it to heart, Mr. Regis. Thank you for your altruistic act of help, which, you must allow me to point out, is something of a novelty where I came from. I truly didn’t mean to offend.”

Regis’ expression softened, again, almost undetectably, “None taken. And I noted that altruistic act of help, although as you pointed out, was something of a novelty, it is still in the collection of many,” eyeing Geralt, who’s now trying to stand. The altruistic witcher and his company, Rana glanced over with an stony indifference, were all rustling to get up.

Geralt curtsied to Regis with a nod, and asked Rana to speak with him outside of the hut.

The black-haired woman stood in front of Geralt dressed in a long tight black dress with thin white vertical stripes on the sides, stretching all the way to her slender calf. Geralt remembered the first time he glanced at her, he could almost swore that he saw Yennefer. But now he couldn’t believe he’d make that mistake, even for a split of a second. For in everything she’s similar to Yen, there’s a minor detail that pointed to a major difference.

Like Yennefer, she dressed in black and white, but her dress was mostly black, the whites were but decorations, not a question of balance nor contradiction. Like Yennefer, she had black hair, but hers was cropped all the way up to her neck, forming a reversed-V shape in her nape, there’s no raven locks waving with graceful movement, instead she reminded him of a solider; she walked with precision and a force, when she turned her head, the longer tip of her hair fluttered and glistened like blades. And she certainly did not smell like lilac and gooseberry; she smelled like something subtle and indistinguishable to the witcher, who knew practically every common herb on this land. Her eyes, however, did flash like Yennefer’s when her dress got pulled by one of the peasant boy from the refuge group, and she looked as if she’s ready to strike that kid down, had his mother not hushed him away while looking fearfully at the black-haired woman.

_She clearly had no intention to align herself with maternal instinct, unlike Yen_. Geralt thought. _During the four days of travel alongside Zoltan and his band, she also exhibited great discomfort at every opportunity when food was offered to her, be it cold horse jerky, stew made of mushrooms, whatever Percival Schuttenbach found in the bushes, or oatmeal porridge, which was actually somewhat of a rarity in this deserted area. Made no difference to her. She barely ate anything, and nobody bothered to take the extra measure to convince her otherwise, given the portion of the food and the amount of people in the group._

_Nobody, save for Dandelion, who initially advanced at her despite the dire situation surrounded us, as his complicated poet’s nature demanded. The woman, unlike Milva, did not seem to be bothered by Dandelion’s attention. They rode together and talked often, meaning, she asked questions while Dandelion eagerly grasping the opportunity to show off his wide range of knowledge on world geography, politics, and folklore._

_I disliked her then. I found her eyes too inexplicable and her smile too insincere. She did not look like a refuge and I somehow did not possess enough knowledge to make a speculation about her. She’s not a sorceress for I did not sense her magic aura nor did my medallion tremble once, so for certain she couldn’t have used magic then. But she was not an ordinary commoner either. There was something ominous about that strange scar on her right temple, glowed vaguely in the dusk. Her dress and accent were also strange, less ominous, but providing no more answers; they were from nowhere I’ve been. An enigma. Which, ironically, actually ruled out her possibility of being a spy, since spies are usually adorned with family chronicles and trustworthy personal histories. She’s mysterious, but not secretive._

_And,_ Geralt thought, not without reluctance, _and there really was something in her that reminds me of…… of Yen. I’m unable to hate her or propose to not leave her by the road simply for the precaution during wartime. When she’s by herself sitting in the outskirt of campfire at night, when she thought she’s far enough in the shadow and that no one would notice her, when she bored her eyes into the fire and curled up to herself, she looked like the doll I had seen in Aretuza, or rather, she reminds me of a woman who did not have such doll in a time, long before we’ve ever met. And those eyes…… they looked like they wanted to tell a story, but didn’t know to whom or even how. I didn’t know how to leave her by herself._

_So I told her just that. To my own amazement actually. After what happened on Thanedd, I never mentioned Yen to anyone, not even to myself. I was afraid; afraid of possibilities I refused to believe in, and of the consequences caused by them. But I told her. And she listened. I had needed to talk to someone; someone who heard little of the ballads or the political tidings, and probably cared little of them equally. I don’t know how much she cares about what I said, but I needed to talk to someone. And I was glad that she listened, and she replied with only her eyes. Even though those eyes bloomed in coldness, indistinguishable of any emotions if she meant any. Somehow it still reminded of Yen. And a reminder was much needed back then. Even I didn’t know exactly how much sense was there in going on; there were so many questions and not enough answers to make sense of what had happened. But thanks to the reminder: one does not live by reason alone._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rana's dream was the dream of Ciri dancing in a barn with Iskra. BTW, I just came across some really incredible art on Instagram by @milliganvick; she recently posted a series of photo-stories of dancing-in-the-barn scene as Cahir dreamt it. IT'S GOT MAGIC. Here's [the link. ](https://www.instagram.com/milliganvick/)


	2. The Name of Rose

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rana had thought she liked forests, and she did like them, before she was actually put in one. The street she had spent most of her childhood on had four mango trees. Slender and not terribly tall. But that’s about where her botanic knowledge and real-life experience ended. She had liked them back then, often romanticizing the idea of taking walks in a forest like people in her grandma’s time used to. She never associated forests with magical creatures like ghouls and vampires and other “hell spawns” as Milva had put it. This was not her environment. This world was not her world.
> 
> So all the more grateful she was with the company of Regis.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: f word, mention of drug abuse, mention of death of a loved one.
> 
> Night City will be the place where everything in Cyberpunk 2077 happens. It's a city in California, USA.
> 
> A little bit background of this story for those who haven’t read the books BUT DON'T mind spoilers (such as I; I read many books knowing the endings first and just loved the writings anyway. And the process of reading I guess).
> 
> Spoiler alert!!
> 
> After Regis joined Geralt’s band heading south. An mentally ill girl was “discovered” to be a witch among the refugees by the Chotla river, and the band weren’t there just to watch the mob burning an innocent girl, decided to become her defender and accepted challenges: picking up a burning hot horseshoe without getting burn marks. The magical vampire Regis stopped our bestest dwarf master Zoltan the last minute and took the trial by himself. Before the local fanatic practiced his exorcism skills on Regis, the Nifgaardian troops came and clashed with the Cintrian army. Everyone scattered away, Dandelion and Geralt were captured by the Cintrians and waited to be hanged (the general public opinion was Geralt, along with Yen and Vilgefortz, became traitors and handed Ciri to Emyhr), Milva went to find their horse and was almost taken advantages of by some rouge refugees, but Cahir stepped in just in time. Both feeling iffy about the dark forest, decided to rescue D & G in the morning. In the book, Regis then appeared “out from the gloom,” gave them a bit startle. Then Regis went to rescue D&G by himself, using his vampirc powers. Geralt, having guessed his nature, huffed and puffed, telling him to never show up again. But of course Regis wouldn't leave these good people in need, especially Dandelion, with a head wound, and Geralt, with a wound somewhere deeper inside:P He came back later and officially became part of the hansa <3

> “What's in a name? That which we call a rose.
> 
> By any other word would smell as sweet.”

The forest had grown quieter with the fall of dusk. Everything cooled down effectively with the eeriness that seemed to be one with the forest itself, and they heard no footsteps all the way since the camp incident. They were sure that some people out of the hundreds of refugees had survived, but if they did, they did not make it loud enough to show.

Rana had thought she liked forests, and she did like them, before she was actually put in one. The street she had spent most of her childhood on had four mango trees. Slender and not terribly tall. But that’s about where her botanic knowledge and real-life experience ended. She had liked them back then, often romanticizing the idea of taking walks in a forest like people in her grandma’s time used to. She never associated forests with magical creatures like ghouls and vampires and other “hell spawns” as Milva had put it. This was not her environment. This world was not her world.

So all the more grateful she was with the company of Regis.

Some hours earlier, everyone was still at the refugee camp by the Chotla river and haggled unsuccessfully for provisions. Then, to Rana’s absolutely good fucking luck, they became the witnesses of a classic witch trial, and the good company was not satisfied with their status being mere witnesses, but proceeded to volunteer as defenders of the innocent “witch.” The local religious fanatic requested that defenders must remove a horseshoe out of the burning fire without bearing burnt marks.

Rana had thought things would, and perhaps should, result in violence, when the barber-surgeon Regis went through the “baptism of fire,” so to speak, proved the girl’s innocence and shocked all the audiences. Before anyone could have asked any pressing questions, a troop trotted over and all the frightened peasants scurried, taking those who weren’t so frightened along with them.

The crowd separated them like a great wave. Before Rana could shout out a “what’s going on,” she could barely spot the archer’ golden brown hair and make out the helpless cries from the bard. She could have been trampled by horse hooves once or twice, but luckily she had plenty experiences with avoiding fast-moving vehicles. Also thanks to her eyes, which were still functioning pretty well with motion-sensoring, and calculated better paths for her to get to the opposite side of where all the clamoring was raging. She ended up surrounded by shrubs and tree leaves, then the sounds of yelling and screaming became more distant, until she was trapped alone with herself in the forest. Somewhere in the forest. And she had no idea where. The branches of trees stretched out in clutches of each other, there was barely any room for sunlight to come through, not to say enough for her to recognize directions by the sun.

Not too long after the racket of people shouting and crying left her completely, she started to feel the tiny hairs on her back stood up and a chill running down her spine. There were noise coming from everywhere, fuzzy and indistinguishable; she’d swear she heard them, but she saw nothing when she turned around several times.

When it did happen, it happened very fast and noiselessly to human ears.

Rana’s eyes captured a shadowy movement lunging at her from eight o’clock in the rear and leapt as far as she could. She wouldn’t have been able to see it coming, had she not installed those eyes. _American Eagle 2.5., See your world with the eyes from the king on the sky._ The imitation technology had made it possible for her to see around 310 degrees, give or take. But that only saved her a little time and a chance to better look at what lunged at her:

an ugly, big piece of pink humanoid that walked on all fours, having spikes extruding out from its spine randomly. It fixed its big fishy eyes on her and opened its mouth, flashing its yellow and brown teeth. Then it waved its right claw towards Rana, long, sharp, and thick nails smelled of a painful death. She fell backwards on the ground.

In what felt longer than a split of a second yet precisely a split of a second, several things happened: the algoul thought he was going to have his appetizer, Rana smelled the scents of sage, wormwood, anise, and coriander, Regis appeared between the two seemingly out of thin air. Then, to the horror of both the algoul and Rana, Regis also opened his mouth and flashed his teeth, which were porcelain white and with pointed ends; like a shark’s teeth. He made a sound to the algoul that could at best be described as a growl, and without any amazement or doubt, the algoul retreated. First it backed off a few steps like courtiers being dismissed by the king, then turned around and ran so fast before Rana could catch her breath or decide which way to escape.

Of course, such thoughts were for brain exercise only, because her legs were even spongier than before Regis had shown up, she couldn’t even stand, let alone run.

The silver lining: she’s sure that she had not pissed herself; after all, she had seen some stuff before, _just, not a……_ The word came to her mind, it seemed so ridiculous and unrealistic. But then, her mere appearance at this place and this time was also pretty ridiculous and unrealistic. After what had happened, almost everything seemed probable now. She decided to just ask.

“So,” Rana swallowed, trying to make herself look at Regis while she spoke, “You are a… vampire?” Despite her best effort, her voice quivered at the end, making the intended statement sound like a question.

And Regis answered, also trying to make himself look at her while he spoke, “Indeed. That is what they call me. I am, classified by peasants, scholars, and other professionals alike, as a monster, a hellish creature resulted from the so-called Conjunction of Spheres.” He paused, pursed his lip hard, and suddenly looked her directly in the eyes.

 _He’s searching for something, desperately._ Rana thought with surprise. What could a vampire be searching in the eyes of human? She wanted to say it might be fear, or maybe even fascination fueled by some fetish, but she saw a pair of eyes that sought neither of those things. She saw in his eyes her reflection, a petrified young woman lying on the ground, supporting herself by the arms, looking so small and stranded. She saw that he wanted to hold out a hand to help her get up, but was afraid the action would only result in screaming, perhaps backed up by precedented memories. In his dark eyes, Rana saw something she never saw much before she happened in this world, and she remembered something she read somewhere else:

_“A rose by any other name would smell just as sweet.”_

Rana held out her right hand to Regis. When their hands touched, she smiled, showing her teeth, and Regis smiled back, also showing his teeth. This time, she didn’t even flinch.

Now the forest had grown completely dark with night’s fall, Rana’s eyes switched on its thermal vision automatically. With only occasional bright yellow spots darting quickly in the boroughs and among the branches: rabbits and birds. Their surrounding became an unfriendly blending of greens and blues. Amid the cold colors, Regis was a cloud of warm orange and intense pink, _which meant his body temperature was somewhere around 27 to 29 Celsius degree. Another observation of the very mysterious vampire._ The note in Rana’s mind pulled the corner of her mouth up. It did not go unnoticed. Regis broke the peaceful silence by asking her to reveal her secret for “the beam,” Rana told him she wasn’t mocking anyone present. Bu once someone had said something, it just seemed unfit to go back in silence, so they chatted on.

“So, why do this? Taking up as a barber-surgeon, now traveling with a witcher, whose profession, according to my understanding, is to kill monsters?” Rana immediately regretted her last word, wishing she’d bit her tongue instead. She stuttered in an attempt to mend her indiscretion. In truth, though, she didn’t really mind associating him with the word; the word with him was rendered harmless, only seemed exotic, special, even. “Sorry, I mean, that is the catalogue _people_ put you in, right?”

Regis waved a hand in a careless fashion. “People do. And I have to say they are not entirely wrong from their perspectives……” He sighed, but quickly spoke again, “Deeds once committed, regardless of the nature of even the performer, became apparitions that reside in our halls and feed on our guilty conscience. Although dispelling these darkness is no easy task, a haunted house is better than none at all. ”

“So in your opinion, what’s the best way to bust the ghosts?” Rana asked, not for the politeness of a conversationalist, but actually wanted to know. She remembered her own ghosts.

Regis smiled with pursed lips and said, “I wouldn’t say there’s a best way, but I would say that ghosts will not be dispelled by ballads; only actions, even ones as small and trivial as lighting up a candle. Thus I answer your query on my chose profession, Miss Rana: I thought I chose something that would help.”

 _Help who?_ She thought, but did not say it. “Please, just Rana. And it sounds like quite a background story. Wanna light a candle yourself?”

Regis looked away and kept on walking, so she nudged on, “Was it really so bad? That you cannot even drop a hint? To someone you just rescued?” Rana shot out the questions. In the silence of the forest, her own voice suddenly sounded unnecessarily interrupting.

She heard him sigh, his voice was tired. “It’s…… personal.”

It was quiet again. Rana could hear her own breathing, very quick comparing to Regis’. In the bushes, some kind of incest rubbed their wings. On the trees, birds exchanged reports in hushed pitches and carefully tapped one foot then the another.

She felt the nature was closing in on her, with this awkward silence, pregnant with questions and opportunities. Opportunities she had faced before but did not take and did not want to take. What changed? She couldn’t exactly point out what and why, but she supposed things should change and did because she’s in a different place now. A place with forests and magic. A place without neon light and Trauma Team International. A place where she was helped without questions of price, and a place where it seemed had no limit of possibility. A place for her to be Rana.

And Rana decided to take the opportunity. Just a small candle. She said to herself.

“I also worked at a place that helped. So I told myself. I used to go out with medical teams six days a week anytime we were called. I thought we were helping, giving people chances I wish my brother had. But it’s a lie. They weren’t helping, they were making profits. People like my brother were never given anything and certainly not those chances, those very expensive, privileged chances. They let people die. I let people die. If anyone, it’s only myself I helped. I got a place to sleep and I’m still alive. And my brother remained dead.” _There, the ghosts._ Rana heard her own flat voice and was surprised. Both the voice and how the little candle turned into wildfire. She hadn’t mentioned her brother ever since the accident thirteen years ago; to no one besides the police. She didn’t know how she just said it and just like that, no trembling fury, no clutched fists, no hysteria, not even bitterness.

 _Was it really that long ago? And I am no more a twelve-year-old, waiting for my mother to wake up from those perpetual drug-induced dreams? Before I told him, all these are just stories in my head, now it gained its independence._ Her “big brother,” who was only fifteen himself back then, who was forced to act as the caretaker of both the sister and the mother, who’d never say a good word when she succeeded in one of those “cooking experiments,” but always saved all the protein and the occasional real meat for her. Were they really separated for so long already? In these thirteen years, Rana had refused to talk to anyone about her brother. Those who cared said she was in denial, and some thought she went cold by the ways of Night City. Only she knew it was neither. She never let herself forgot two facts: her brother died, and she loved him, maybe even more than he had loved her-- she only had her brother, but he had known their mother three year longer then, maybe he'd seen her in better shapes and that fueled all his fierce devotion that followed? She just believed it’s only in her head he was preserved. In her private, organic memories, he could be just how she remembered him, untainted by no one else’s added memories and words. Although she never tried to talk to an imaginary him. She knew it’d only make her more sentimental than necessary and she didn’t need that to survive -- She had to live on to keep her brother’s memories a little longer. But during those really difficult nights and early mornings, she dreamed about him, them. Them happy together, them arguing about small things like the new paint of the car. Them living in a slightly different-looking city. Some nights, their mother was in the dream, too. And there was a man. She thought it must be their father. Those dreams could not be more boring and ordinary, filled with unimportant everyday conversations and chores and places, but they made her heart ache when she woke up, facing the cold reflective emptiness in her cramped apartment, alone.

She didn’t know she so wanted to mention it, to make all those years before and afterwards real even if it stung her throat as she spoke. By keeping her ghost to herself exclusively, she felt she gained some control over the unsteadiness of her life, but she also kept the house in dark for too long. She kept herself in dark for too long, a dream, in it only her ghosts. Now that she said it, she felt that small candle light flickered and its flame touching her dream. It burned, but it was welcomed.

Rana looked down at her feet, mindlessly walking, feeling the strange empty relief one usually got after sharing a secret out loud. Maybe she was waiting for a reply. She did not know what she was expecting. She had never taken the opportunity before.

Just when she started to feel awkward and annoyed by the muted vampire, Regis gave her the reply she did not know she was expecting.

She felt a gentle touch on her left shoulder and looked back, it was Regis. Rana looked at him. His black cloak, slightly disheveled and dusty on the bottom rims. His leather bag strapped over the shoulder, permeating strong scents of sage, wormwood, anise, and coriander. A scent she felt she would never forget. His face, soft contours and aquiline nose, a tad too bent. And his black onyx eyes, deep and vast like the night sky. She saw many things and she saw nothing. Words deserted her, only her senses remained.

“I’m sorry.” Regis said. In that second Rana felt all the blood and words flooded inside her and threatened to erupt with torrents, regardless of situations and consequences. _No, I don’t want to. At least not yet_. She summoned all her strength and finally said, “Are we still far?”

Perhaps the question took Regis by surprise, Rana felt his inquisitive gaze on her and his hand withdrew noiselessly. His voice was still soft when he spoke, “I believe we’ve nearly reached Milva.”

As they continued walking, the thick silence felt less awkward and more comforting, although it did not last long. With his mildly annoying ( _yet amusing and endearing at the same time!_ ) mannerism, Regis asked if Rana was feeling like herself, to which Rana replied with a question:

“What about your personal matter? Feeling like lighting some candles for your newly confessed company?”

“I see I can’t escape from you so easily now,” Regis smiled, without hiding his fangs. Rana was not looking at him but concentrating on the faint red glows a few yards away. Before Regis said anything else, she spoke.

“Milva’s not alone.” She said dryly and felt her muscle tensing up.

“No, she is not. The Nifgaardian has been following us is with her.” Suddenly Regis was a few steps ahead of her, making his expression hard to see. Then he turned around and said, “when we reach there, we shall see what happens.” 

Before they reached the little camp set by Milva and the young Nifgaardian, Regis stopped Rana. “When this matter resolves, which I hope would and in a peaceful manner… in any case, stay with Milva while I go for the witcher and Dandelion. And take care.” He said in such a serious tone, as if he knew he won’t be coming back. Rana was puzzled, looked at him under her brows and said nothing. Then they heard a woman’s nervous voice talking, sounding like Milva.

So, with Regis leading, they stepped out from the gloom, in which many more words could have been said but were not.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading and leaving kudos! And as always, any advice and general comment will be greatly appreciated!


	3. Bridge

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The battle over the bridge. Bonding.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Elder speech vocab. appeared in this chapter:
> 
> Saov- soul, spirit, ghost  
> Woéd- woods, forests, trees.  
> Uniade- unite, join
> 
> TW: Miscarriage.

> _Magic is a key which opens forbidden doors to nightmares…… Once you learn to control the Art, you will gain power over fire, water, earth and air. Power over people's minds. Power over yourself."_
> 
> Anabelle Radfind _, An Invitation to Magic_
> 
> _Unlike the cases of lycanthropes, werewolves, and berserkers (note: also go by the name Vildkaarl by Skelligers), the feeling of taking in a beast’s form inside our prophetic dreams is but illusions. For many years I have endeavored to find out the reasons behind such agency or if the said agency is necessary when one seeks images from the future. The conclusion thus far is that while it is not necessary for all prophetic dreams (my humble self had experienced this first-handedly, to start with), animals retained a deeper and stronger connection to the nature throughout the years of progression than that of human's, therefore making it easier for them to detect the changes in the Elements, which form our paths to the future. Later sections will further discuss the various sources I came upon to help proving this finding._
> 
> Jacob Typpetre Jr _., Dream Worlds and Otherwise_

Rana was mindlessly poking at the bursting embers in their campfire with a birch twig, when she felt a small belch coming up and almost failed to cover it up. 

Today Milva hunted down some rabbits so they had a pretty meal. Although Rana knew she’s probably going to feel the wrath of hunger soon enough, since there were six of them and only two rabbits, but for now, she's good. Happy, even. The heat of the fire, lingered smells of grilled meat and random but friendly conversations kept her spirit lifted, she felt fresh even after spending weeks in the “dank wilderness,” walking on foot, and the last time she washed her whole body was two days ago; in a stream, icy cold. But she thought she wouldn’t exchange all these for living a night in her apartment in Night City. She’s taken a liking to this “underdeveloped” world because of its people. Four people and a vampire, more specifically.

This desolate land Rana lived inside herself these years, once dreamt about a sea of golden wheats bending on the winds of harvest. All that cracked surface needed was a little rain. A little kindness. She felt the sprouts preparing themselves and was full of hope-- she caught herself laughing without thinking twice yesterday and she liked it.

What Rana didn’t like so much, were certain dreams.

She rarely remembered her dreams. In Night City, She had trouble sleeping on a regular basis even with her heavy workload, and relied her sleep on pills. Among those dreams she did remember, almost all were about her brother. But since Rana got to this world, her sleep improved and her dreams became much more vivid and unforgettable. Regis explained the correlation between better sleep and forest walking, but what was it with the dreams?

Rana felt as though the dreams were not hers but of the animals she was dreaming as. Twice had she woke up drenched in sweat and with blood taste in her mouth, after dreaming she was a wolf running along with her pack in the forest, hunting, and scavenging. She saw dead bodies, some lay in the ravine, some hung on branches. She saw many with pointed ears. And though the taste wasn’t comparable to fresh kills, she and her pack all filled their bellies. And another time, she dreamed she was flying over a churning sea, in a gull’s body. The wind fumed and thunder exploded, threatening to tear her apart and she screamed in a bird’s scream. Underneath her, on the sea, unnatural fog foamed and enveloped a ship, she heard people screaming and saw light flashing and the ship was gone.

Rana had no idea dreams could be so realistic. She dreamt, and dreamt not “as if” but “as.” In those dreams, she was the wolf and the gull, with her teeth tearing rotting flesh and wings flapping against salty wind. And Rana had no idea what she was supposed to make of those dreams. When she finally decided to talk about it, the fellowship reached no consensus of opinion at first, until Dandelion, for once proved to be so dependable, spoke, but not before he struck a string on his lute.

“Wolf-skinned they are so named.

In battle with blood their shields smear.

Red with…”

Geralt interrupted before he could finish the graphic scene. “Spare us your talent for something later, Please. Explain where you are going with this.”

“The most renowned war ballad, Ulfhednar. Has not one of you heard of it?” The bard adjusted the strings of his lute and sneered.

Regis chimed in, as usual, offering his mysteriously gathered knowledge on every subject. “Ulfhednar, or Wolf-skinned in common speech, by the skellige skald Torbjørn Hafnir, in honor of jarl Harald the Fairhaired, who, according to legends, was raised by she-wolves and could turn into a giant wolf in battle himself. Quite the fearful tale, I will say…”

“So a werewolf? Did your parents used that to scare you as a kid?” Rana laughed, truly amused on the idea and the image in her head. Regis ignored her and continued, “However, how much credence can we lend to artistic rework of historical figures, and the relation to Rana’s dreaming experience are still unclear. I’m afraid I missed the point, Dandelion. But you can’t be suggesting Rana was a shapeshifter simply because of the dreams?”

“I’m not suggesting anything, mere pointing at a direction from an artist’s eyes. On the other hand, they do say art is based on life. At night we are all fast asleep, who’s to say Rana couldn’t slip out during those spells?”

“I could. I, I mean, we vampires, don’t need as much sleep as you humans. And I usually like to keep a watchful eye at night.” Regis said in a low voice, as though a little embarrassed.

Rana wiggled uncomfortably in effort to ease off her self-consciousness, now she’s not only the center of the discussed topic, but also found out someone could have seen her sleeping, and a Regis at that. She felt her own face flushed. She cleared her throat and said, “No, I don’t think I can change shapes. And if I did, I should have been soaked wet when I dreamed as the gull, or actually had blood in my mouth when I dreamt as a wolf. They were not real, just… games of sensations. What I don’t understand was why _now_. I’ve had dreams that felt real, but never like this before I came to this place. It’s like this place is affecting me with its magic or some other spooky shit like that.” She spoke the truth. This place affected her in many ways. But not the way she talked. She’s afraid that can’t be helped.

Milva has been listening in silence until then, she was straightening her arrow shafts with hot water, now suddenly raised her head. “When I was with the dryads, sometimes I spent nights inside Brokilon, and my dreams became more livid in those nights, too. Though only once like yours. The dryads called it ‘Saov y Woéd an uniade,’ and said it’s the spirits of trees showing me things that happened to others elsewhere. It’s to do with magic, connection to the elements and that sort of thing. Lady Eithné told me, with training the true talented can see what exactly they wish to, but she didn’t try to teach me, naturally. After all, I’m just a human in her debt, no matter how many times I risked my hide.”

They all fell silent. The only thing heard, for quite a while, was the continuous loud crackling of firewood, quickly gathered and still damp on the inside. 

“So,” Rana said, slowly and mindlessly poking at the bursting embers in their campfire with a birch twig, “Maybe my dreams aren’t all useless mind-troubling crap, as I thought earlier. Maybe they really were visions, and who knows, maybe I’d seen something that’d contribute to our goal? Or I might in the future?” She would like to be useful. Not just in the sense of returning their help, but she really wanted to. They accepted her into their “fellowship” without questioning the history she’s not yet ready to talk about. And what’s more, they were, essentially, good people. Not something that came by every day.

The taciturn young man from the south, Cahir, who had been wearing a thoughtful expression since Rana started talking about her dreams, did not speak until now. “In those dreams, do you always see from an animal’s medium? Have you ever… dreamt just as yourself? Like a bystander?” His fingers fidgeted at his necklace, a thin golden chain with the pendant hidden inside the shirt.

Rana was a little taken aback by this very specific, almost whimsical-natured question. _What does he know? Does he dream my dreams?_ Rana thought, but did not ask, instead, she said, “I have.” She paused for a second, continued, “I was a teenage girl, with pale hair, dancing in a barn. Noisy all around me. That was my first dream here. The night you all got drunk from Regis’ moonshine.” Upon finishing her reply, Rana noticed the look on Cahir’s face and followed his gaze, found Geralt in a similar strange expression. The look on Cahir’s face could be interpreted as a plea, and to which Geralt eventually sighed, and spoke.

“We know the dream, that’s Ciri. You were in her place in that dream.” Geralt paused, looking down into the dying fire, then spoke again, but his voice changed, “she’s not in a good place. And she needs me.” He got up so suddenly the remaining fire whooshed, threatening to expire right then, “Let’s sleep. It’ll be a long day ahead of us.”

And it was.

The group was caught between a frenzied battle when they were trying to cross Yaruga. Regis, to everyone’s dismay, was struck down by an arrow to the chest, and Milva shot her own to the soldiers on the bank, temporarily turning the tide over. Then the vampire had a lighthearted come-back, which Rana supposed shouldn’t be a surprise after all; she expected it’d take much more than an arrow to take down an vampire. The ill-lucked ferryman, also struck down by an arrow, however, did not have the caliber and flew overboard into the river. Then more ill luck followed, and though they managed to step on dryland, Milva miscarried due to her injury, all the while when the Nifgaardian army getting the upper hand in battle. Regis did not waste any moment to perform an surgery to extract the stillborn, Cahir and Geralt jumped onto the bridge, trying to push back the fleeting soldiers, Dandelion also joined the cord with his newly acquired thunderous speech. Rana stayed, with Milva and Regis.

Later when she had time to recollect, Rana thought that moment could have been a dangerous moment for all the humans, fighting with the Northern kingdoms or against alike, when Regis was kneeling in front of Milva, and inside of a puddle of blood that’s getting larger and larger.

Rana also kneeled down and had Milva’s head in her lap, but didn’t know what she could do to ease her pain. She saw tear streaks on Milva’s face, contorted by pain, then more tears followed the tracts. Milva mumbled something indistinctly, Rana couldn’t make out, but she heard “child,” and she pitied the girl. The girl who’d became a woman too early in her life, who had little love from her own mother, who wanted to refuse to be a mother, but ultimately chose to accept the prospect that—she can, if she wished to, choose to not repeat an unhappy childhood, only to have the prospect taken away so few days later.

But Rana barely knew love herself, she had just began to learn. She had no words. She only held Milva’s hands in her own, and let the girl clasp them tight when the next wave of pain took over.

And Regis. His fingers moved with the precision of an aged surgeon, his eyes fixed and not a single bead of sweat was on his temple. _How was he so calm?_ Only when the whole thing finished, did Rana notice how awkwardly Regis wiped the tiny metal surgical instrument on his apron and how his fingers struggled to put it back into his pouch, how dark his eyes became and how his pupil had dilated. Her heart pounded, first in fear then in regret. She just realized what he must have been going through; soldiers screaming, as their blood spilling over the battlefield; Milva, in front of him, so close, within reach, powerless……

“Hey.” She touched his arm, at the same time trying to hold Milva up. “Are you good?” She asked, in the most gentle voice she could imagine.

Regis shot an affronted look with his black eyes, then, as if realizing the concern in question was not directed because of him but _at_ him, quickly lowered his gaze. He spoke with a low and somewhat hoarse voice.

“Everything had been under control. Don't doubt it. Now we need to move to a safer area. Can you walk, miss Milva?” He looked at Milva with worry.

Milva’s legs collapsed as soon as she tried to stand straight, Rana caught her weight.

“Somebody carry her! We need to move to the left side, Geralt and Cahir are occupied by fighting those Nifgaardian whoresons. There’s no time to lose!” Dandelion jumped down from the bridge and lurched towards then. With Dandelion on one side and Rana on the other, they drew the pale-faced Milva by her arms and were about to pull her up, when Regis swiftly stooped down, wrapped his cloak around Milva and, with an effortless movement, picked her up into his arms.

“I have to deliver her to the safer shore first, then I will come back for you.” His eyes swept over them.

“I can swim. We will manage it here. Go.” Rana assured him, and held Dandelion by the hand.

Regis’ onyx black bored into Rana’s eyes just a little bit longer. Then, with Milva in his arms, Regis leapt towards the left bank in several incredible lightning-fast springs, barely touched piers and fallen pieces from the bridge.

And so it was, when later, after the battle had ended with Cahir and Geralt won _(to hell with the rest of it, politics and people)_ and Milva sleeping on a clean bed, Rana spoke to Regis, as they were both sitting outside of the medical tent.

“I’m glad you were there to help Milva.” She said, in a slightly shaky voice, hollowed a little bit by the memories of blood and fire they just went through a few hours ago.

Regis looked towards the Yaruga river, glistening in the setting sun, then, he turned his head to Rana.

“I’m glad you were there to help me.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The second epigraph is a reference to Alice Sheldon (James Tiptree Jr.). I love her works, and though this quote was made up based on my witcherlore knowledge, I wanted to find a place to put it, and I was reading that book, so added it here. Also, maybe later, a woman who's an expert on dreams here actually took up a penname like that and wrote some books;)


	4. En’ca Minne

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Someone invited someone in to decipher the subject of the painting that hung in the room, and someone asked permission to bring a better wine. Neither wanted to think about Angoulême’s inquiry eyes tomorrow, neither knew what exactly they were trying to do. But both wanted, knowing it’d only be for a short while even if they did get it, a little warmth. A little love."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> En’ca minne means "a little love" in Elder Speech. Sorry this one is longer than the previous chapters. I was unable to cut more and still feel like the relationship was developing more or less naturally.  
> I'm a fan of kaeltale's Regis fanfic and there's[a new one that's really good about him and Queen of the Night ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16954254). It's sort of my headcanon for Regis and his ex now.  
> I also headcanon [ this fanfic by jikanet_tanaka ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/9437795/chapters/21354776)on how the bloodthirsty punk Regis became the Regis Geralt knows.  
> This chapter contains some twisted feelings kind of fluff.

> _Certainly what we dream would not always be in a peaceful place of bloom; it would have some peace, and occasional blooms, but always some chaos looms underneath what we see. There is no way our dreams will be always peacefully happy for such are not our lives. Our dreams, like our lives, are committed to the road of turmoil and only when we accept that, can we gain power inside our dreams, to bypass what we see with our eyes, pull through, until we reach the truth we seek…..._
> 
> Jacob Typpetre Jr _., Our Dreams Rose Up Forever_

Velen. Toussaint.

A few feet below the balcony to Rana’s room, the mist rolled, its ethereal waves moved languidly and surely, ascending, collided against the delicate snow-white alabaster columns of Beauclair Palace. The autumn sun had just rested behind Mount Gorgon, and soon the mists shall extend to the horizon, cloaking everything under the protection of its obscurity.

Rana leaned with her back against the balustrade, looking, not at the scenery behind, but to the direction of her room. Toussaint was a charming place, and each sunset a wonder, but right now, she was only paying attention to the figure stood on the balcony with her.

“Thank you. For cooperating, and for the new wine. It _is_ better than Est Est.”

“I am gladdened to hear. I surmise you indeed liked it much.” Regis bowed his head slightly, eyeing the half-empty bottle on the floor. 

“Hmm. Nuragus, you said? Where did you learn about it? I somehow have a feeling that it’s to do with _someone_.” 

Rana knitted her brows in a frown, but didn’t bother to hide her smirk. She poured the wine almost to the brim into a cup, which had a small lip shade stain on one side, and gestured to Regis, in the process, spilling drops on the marble floor of the balcony.

Regis shook his head and looked around; _only one chair_ , so he, too, leaned with his back against the balustrade instead.

So how did the two ended up drinking on that balcony that particular evening? Let’s start with counting the dreams Rana had, each more bizarre than the other, and with every morning splitting from her dream trailing a stronger, unwavering sense of premonition.

Rana hated that feeling. She always liked to be good at _something_. Or, at least, to be able to learn how to get good at it. Here, she quickly learned to speak less otherworldly-- from speech patterns of Milva and Dandelion—so not to arouse suspicion; she learned how to make fire like “in the olden days;” she even learned and actually remembered a few edible herbs and mushrooms, from Regis. But it’s pure disorientation when it came to her dreams. Dreams were nothing worth learning about back in Night City, and here there’s not much to learn from her companions. She felt like she got a problem stuck to her; a problem with no solution attached on the other side.

The night just after Geralt and Cahir ended up fighting with each other like some schoolboys, Rana dreamt a dark-haired woman, tied to an iron chair. There were two other men with her in the filthy room, then the dream exploded in violent tremors of red light pulsing and the air stank horribly of burnt flesh.

She woke up in cold sweat. When the next day, Geralt confessed how desperate he refused to know who had betrayed the fellowship’s information to the enemies, besides Angoulême, Rana saw each of their faces exhibited a different kind of comprehension and felt she had some strange grasp of the matter as well. Except she couldn’t have. Only a phrase repeated in her head again and again, telling her “He’s wrong.” But who was “he”? What was wrong? Wrong about what? All these questions begged for answers.

Then, after months of unlucky turns of events, they were finally smiled upon by Lady Luck and everyone was put into some guest rooms of Duchess of Toussaint. When all the strange things should shut themselves up and let Rana finally rest herself on a real bed with soft linen comforting her body, she began to dream of a place reeked of plague and death. Night after night, she was a mouse, nested in an enormous castle that always smelled like urine, shit, and blood. And it’s always fucking _cold_.

Rana despised those dreams. She couldn’t remember what exactly she saw in each dream, but they always ended with a lot of loud commotions and blood.

And horrible screaming. She especially disliked the screaming, even over the feeling of fleabites. She couldn’t point a finger to what exactly, but something about certain screams deeply disturbed her. She didn’t want to admit it, but deep down she knew whose screams she heard, and she’d like to not think about it, even if it’s just a dream. During the small hours of dawn when she managed to tear herself out of those dreams, she could never gather enough courage to go back to sleep. She would get up to watch the sun riseson the balcony, which almost became her favorite place in this whole room the royal Duchess gave her.

The room was among one of those spacious rooms Rana had ever been to, furnished with a painting about some mountains, a fireplace, a pretty big bed for one person, with soft linen bedsheets and blankets, a small bookshelf, and a round-shaped table made of oak wood. Something to write on, nothing to write with. When she asked, she was assured the necessary equipment shall come to the room as soon as she requested. She thought she might later during the day. Not much else to do, maybe it’s time to start sorting out what had been going on these past few months and putting it out visually always helped her.

She liked the room, even though it’s probably nothing too special in reality, but Rana never had a place like that: warm and bright, always. Even the colors were warm and bright. Browns, oranges, and yellows. She used to live in a box made out of alloy inside another bigger box made out of alloy and there’s only coldness. Now she ate real fruits and real meat every day, walked in days soaked with sunlight, and not having to look out for shoot-outs. She didn’t really have to do much of anything actually. And she enjoyed talking to these people from the palace. They amused her and she them. She had to be very careful when talking to the few who were _really_ important, but then, she had plenty of experiences talking to people like that when she worked for Trauma Team; in fact, all she dealt with were people like that. Only, in this place they pretended to be polite and back there nobody bothered.

She liked this place. Maybe this life, too. Rana enjoyed the protection from the Duchess of Toussiant. Rana had a room of her own. Rana didn’t worry every day about losing her job and having to do something dirtier. Rana even had friends who weren’t in the habits of betraying their comrades.

 _The cold room and neon lights and flying ships, that was_ Naomi _._ Naomi _died in an alley and nobody alive cared about it. Now_ Rana _had a real life. All conditions pointed to a new beginning in a land straight out of fairytales._

Rana should feel happy. But somehow she’s not.

More precisely, not anymore. Ever since _the dreams_ , she’s been arrested by this feeling of unease, like it’s been raining for days then finally it got sunny and you couldn’t trust it’d last; or just afraid that now you were reminded how it felt to be warm, when the rain eventually came back, you wouldn’t be able to ignore the chill in your bones anymore.

Rana’s room was close to Milva’s and Angoulême’s, under a palace chapel, while Cahir and Regis, and supposedly, the witcher, lived on the left wing of the palace, closer to the Palace Library. But of course, everyone knew where Geralt stayed, or rather, with whom.

Rana had not much against that Nifgaardian sorceress with short, black hair and bright eyes. In fact, she found her to be quite appealing—she had experimented with quite a few things, as most people in Night City did—but did not careabout her excessively. She had her minds on another. But of course, she didn’t know that back then.

Back then, the dreams annoyed her, almost as much as Regis’ mysterious adventures at night. She thought she had an idea where; Geralt confirmed it one day, when she caught him on his way to the palace kitchen, during one of those mornings he was released from Fringilla Vigo’s “service.”

“You know, Angoulême told me quite a deal about everyone’s adventures in Toussaint these few weeks, with quite some skills, too. I began to doubt if she’s your protégé or Dandelion’s.” Rana paced alongside Geralt, who, Rana thought, had the look of a man living out his wildest happy dream.

She would say that were she a poet, but she was not, so she expressed her thoughts on the matter to Geralt plainly, once they had discovered why he’s staying so indisputably and appearing so scarcely. Rana had been there herself: it’s nice to have your bed warmed by someone alive. Of course, a few orgasms wouldn’t hurt, either, to which Geralt replied by saying nothing.

“Angoulême? I’m sure she did, I can only imagine. Anything exceptionally interesting?” Geralt snorted, but not entirely in a bad mood.

Rana smiled, then heaved a fake sigh. “I wouldn’t even dare to just use the word ‘interesting.’ You know what they say? ‘A miracle; a godsent monster-hunter with his finest work.’ They say you bagged a succubus.”

“As usual, how I would say has to diverge from how ‘they say.’ But no matter. What other ridiculous things did Angoulême tell?”

“Well,” Rana swallowed, tried her best to speak in an indifferent way, “She said Regis disappears day the second sun sets. Was that ridiculous as well?”

Rana peered at Geralt with a side glance, caught Geralt looking at her up and down, blushed and sped her pace up a little. “What?”

This time it’s Geralt’s turn to heave a fake sigh. “I wouldn’t use the word ‘ridiculous,’ for that statement has more grounds than the previous one.”

“What grounds exactly?”

“Are my ears deceiving me? Or are you really looking for evidence of a vampire’s whereabouts at night?”

Well, Rana realized she was. A surprising deduction, not only to Geralt but to herself as well. She refrained from saying anything that might further expose whatever could have been hidden inside her, and pretended that the palace scenery, which she had seen every day for two weeks, had suddenly become remarkably fascinating.

Geralt, seeing they almost reached the kitchen, stopped, thought for a moment, and spoke. This time, he was serious.

“Rana, you know Regis does not only resemble normal people in appearances, he also doesn’t differ much from men in other aspects.” He paused, considering if he should continue and what would be the better words. But Rana saved him the trouble.

“You mean,” she glared at Geralt, “he gets _lonely_ , like you.”

“I mean,” Geralt explained patiently, “it’s only natural for him to want to be around those whose presence might make him feel more at ease. Remember, he is exceptionally good at it, but still in a constant disguise among us. It’s no ordinary task.”

She opened her mouth, but suddenly lost words.

Geralt was right. What exactly was she expecting from Regis? What could she offer _to him_? Regis was a dream, a ghost of another world; even in here. Too much had divided them, too much was in between. A river fuming, its cold limbs forever striking out against the shore, its stream destined within the prearranged course. Everywhere everything lived within boundaries set around principles dictated by powerful men. Within categories. Who was she, to dare even want to challenge that?

Looking down from the terrace of The Pheasantry was the lake that surrounded Hauteville, Seidhe Llygad, _Eye of the Mountain_. Rana could hear troubadours’ love songs drifted from the lakeside pathway and the dock high and low, probably competing for the attention of the several noble ladies lounging nearby, enjoying the lake sight in its evening afterglow.

Rana was also enjoying the lake sight in its evening afterglow, at least, that’s what she told herself. Maybe she’d even find someone to spend a night with, from the bunch of bon vivants gawking at her from the table across since she sat here before sundown.

Why not? She’s by herself. One of them, dressed in a tunic with the color of turquoise, had clean large blue eyes. He turned his face away quickly with a timid look when she caught him looking at her. It was not an unpleasant sight. She felt something stirred inside her, threw back a teasing glance, and ordered more pomegranate juice.

In truth, she’s tempted to order wine instead; after all, she’s learned a few lessons on the local brands since they settled in Beauclair from, well, _Regis_. But she had a very strict principle when it came to the use of substances, including alcohol. She never allowed herself to drink more than her designated alcohol tolerance, and tonight she’s not sure if she’d be able to hold on to that.

The server brought juice on the table, politely asked for the third time if Rana would like to order appetizers for the “guest” she must be expecting. She declined quite untactfully and the server went away—but not before leaving a pitiful look to let Rana know her thoughts on the matter.

Rana noticed she was the only woman around dining alone. It made her more conscious of herself and her meal less appetizing. Could people not just leave a woman alone?Or indeed was it high time for her to find a permit to walk around with?

The blue eyes in turquoise tunic was staring at her again. Rana felt slightly annoyed, not by the young man, but by her own indecisions. She’s surely free to do something, should she choose to; why couldn’t she? _After all, he had……_

How much and how little did she know about herself back then; she was only able to, only chose to understand the humiliating feeling of those unanswerable emotions, she let them surge, overwhelm herself, until she couldn’t be sure of what she might do next. Then she got up suddenly, hurried to get down the stairs, not wanting to give her or Blue Eyes a moment to exchange more glance, wanting, only to flee into the shadows which loomed with no end.

Just when Rana rushed to the bottom of the stairway, she saw a familiar figure walking towards her direction. Her immediate reaction was to trace her step back; maybe to escape from the terrace into the tavern and run away through the other door. Or maybe she could go talk to Blue Eyes and gave herself a perfect excuse to eliminate a conversation with—

Regis, catching her up easily and effortlessly, spoke to her and at once, without any forms of courtesy, quite unlike him.

“Are you due somewhere? What’s the rush?” He spoke in a tone Rana has never heard of before.

“What’s it to you?” Rana replied rather defensively, seeing Regis slinking up the stairs. He was dressed in all black, the golden seams of his brocade doublet gleamed softly against the lights from colorful lanterns, as his jet-black eyes.

Rana wasn’t sure where Regis came out and why, but now that she saw him, she knew all the small resentment she built up for no appropriate reasons could vanish in a second, if he just went on to show a little bit more interest onher. She resented that, too, but there’s no way to dismiss the fact.

“Perhaps I simply wish to speak?” Regis moved a step up, standing above Rana, as though trying to block Rana from going back to the terrace.

“Can I interest you in a dining with me? Maybe some wine, too, if you wish.” He leaned slightly back against the banisters, his voice now relaxed into his usual tone.

A heart-thump. A swallow.

She raised both her eyebrows and shrugged, trying her best to say “sure” with her body, because she didn’t want to speak, for it would certainly expose her quivering voice.

They had Est Est. The innkeeper claimed this batch she got was straight from the celebrated Castel Ravello, so naturally the price was dazing, though, the taste was too smoky for Rana, who’d much prefer the local sugar water over any supposedly sophisticated alcoholic beverage. But after she finished a cup, she was already brave enough to complain about the wine and hasten Regis to finish his hare pâté so they could be on the way. Somehow she was a bit fidgety about Blue Eyes, feeling a little guilty to both, and preferred to avoid another eye contact with him again when Regis was here.

And so they went back to the palace. Someone invited someone in to decipher the subject of the painting that hung in the room, and someone asked permission to bring a better wine. Neither wanted to think about Angoulême’s inquiry eyes tomorrow, neither knew what exactly they were trying to do. But both wanted, knowing it’d only be for a short while even if they did get it, a little warmth. A little love.

And here they were, standing on the balcony, talking. They were floating in a swirling white ocean, in this castle amid a sea of cloud. Alone, with each other. The moon was out, but veiled by the mists.

“So, tell me about this special vampire girlyou met before.” Rana asked.

“What’s to tell?” said Regis, who, with an almost imperceptible movement, swooped her cup away and sat down in the other chair.

“Try start with the name.” Her face hesitated whether to make a funny annoyed expression or not, and she wasn’t sure if her face and her brain had reached aconclusion together and what it was.

She felt quite warm, but not the kind of warm you feel in your body; it’s a feeling in her head, like when she was very little she liked sitting in front of the big windows on their balcony, fenced by rusty thin iron bars, and wait for the autumn sun to wash over her from noon to two in the afternoon. Everything had a little bit golden rim now. His voice flowed like the last bits of honey in the bottle. Unhurried and a little reluctant.

He looked at her for what could have been an eternity, or just a few seconds. Then, with a sigh, he spoke,” Her full name was Lusina Mircalla Justina de Horogszeg, although she — ”

“Shorter than yours.” She blurted in with a chukle.

Regis gave her a glance and continued, “although, she was still in the habit of addressing herself with ‘Carmilla’ last we saw each other. She didn’t particularly care for the names given by her family, as was I.” Another pause, another sigh. “It was, a long time ago; and lasted only two decades. It was a hopeful two decades; but we loved too well and not wisely. And, well, it suffices to say, that I wasn’t behaving like a proper gentleman back then; I guess I wasn’t behaving like a proper vampire neither. I had no plans, no idea how I wanted to live and what to live for. I lived — if it was living— on ravishing sensations that became more and more intoxicating until I never had enough. A desiccated tree. I told myself she was my water, the stream that’d revive me. I think I believed it, maybe even she believed it, too, for some time. Until gradually we both realized that the stream was merely draining itself for…… Well, there was naught to be done so she left. The rest you know.”

She looked at him and his gaze was cast into the dancing shadows of the candlelight. Is that sadness on his face? Or just him being him? Her thoughts darted from one place to another _. I wonder when exactly his head was chopped off and buried. She thought. I wonder if they met again if he wants to meet her again if he’s thinking of her right now._

“I wonder,” she said, she stretched her words long and round carefully to make sure her tongue didn’t get a knot, “what happened in-between. You know, before we landed in the cemetery and after you… regenerated.”

“I traveled.”

“How long? Where did you go to?”

“About one hundred years by human reckoning and to a few places. I was on the journey initially only as a company.”

“Whose?” she mumbled and mumbled some more “who”s and “whom”s.

“One may say he’s a humanist. I could refer to him as a friend for easier understanding in your culture, although it’s more complex than that. He was an Elder of my kind, and actually, one who was born in our home world. I learned a great deal about a variety of subjects from him.”

“Sure you did.” Now her eyes felt a little too heavy. It just occurred to her that she might be drunk. No, tipsy. The thought of getting drunk was still a bit too humiliating to accept without shame, even in this state.

But she didn’t want to go to sleep, not yet. She was suddenly overwhelmed with the feeling of wanting to talk, wanting to listen to him. She looked at him and saw possibilities she never thought about before. Her fingers, dulled by alcohol, ached for the longing to touch him. His dark jacket, shining low under the reflection of firelight. His face, half-way turned towards the candles lit on the small table, presenting a noble profile. Fire danced in his black eyes. She desired him. And desired finally to love.

She filled up another cup and gestured towards him, he shook his head.

“Well, your loss. I mean, are you sure? I won’t judge, promise.” She smiled again, “I don’t think a little bit would hurt… Then again, it wasn’t me who got a problem with addi… Ah, anyway.” She gobbled down the cup in one go, filled another, and fell into one of those talkative moods again. 

“You know, I’ve never been addicted to anything. If anything, I guess I was addicted to not letting myself to be addicted.” She swore and giggled, “if that makes sense at all. I was just really into this idea of having full command of my body parts. It’s why I wasn’t so hot about going full cybernetic, you know. Oh, that is, having body parts that are made and not born; let’s put it this way, I’ll explain it later, promise. And I never went cyborg; besides the eyes, because it’s absolutely needed by my employer. The eyes aren’t too bad. I mean, I had bad visions before anyway.” She let her index finger roam around the rim of the cup, then her expression grew dull.

“But it’s not just the eyeballs; you know. There were a few things they had to remove before installing those. I also don’t have lacrimal glands anymore. So, no tears. At first I liked the sound of it. No tears. It’s good. I always thought that tears are bad. Sadness is bad. What’s the point? It doesn’t help anything. After crying for hours, your ma is still there, going on and on about how much of a disappointment you are and how you’ve ruined her life.. Eventually you get strong enough to leave. Tears had no parts in it. I thought crying is weak. I rejected it.

But—"she sighed softly, “but recently, I’m not sure what’s going on anymore. I mean, sometimes, I get this, this weird feeling; it’s in my stomach, or maybe it's the heart? You know, sort of like a heartburn. But not exactly. Ah. I guess it’s to feel like crying?”

She grew silent. And the silence grew between the both of them. It became very thick, and a little tangy.

Regis wondered if he could reach out to her and touch her hair. The sharp edges of the girl’s short hair seemed to have been softened by the dim candlelight and her befuddled memories. Maybe sadness is bad, he thought to himself, when you are alone. His own memories went back to centuries ago, of a keep by the sea and another sulky friend; it brought a sad smile to his lip. Then the smile grew a little warmer, for her. And he reached out. 

She let him touch her hair. “I don’t know. I don’t know who I should tell of what I saw in those damned dreams, I don’t know if I should at all. It feels so bad. _I_ feel so bad. Would it had been better if I could cry? But there’s nothing from me. I am dried. How can I…? For others? While I am dried up myself? I have nothing to give, nothing.” She looked up, and he saw her widened eyes shone like a crystal he saw once, during his short stay in the Blue Mountains, with his humanist _friend_.

 _What was it called? Fluere? It was made into a cup; the Cup of Aedirn, decorated with vignettes and emblems of Dana Méadbh. Was it supposed to be a gift for the birth of queen Calanthe or the birth of Cirilla the Lioncub of Cintra?_ He didn’t remember which one it was. It was so long ago and he was more absorbed with managing his awful withdrawal symptoms after his first “death” back then. It was, so long ago. 

But he remembered those feelings. Trying hard not to let the guilt and sense of worthlessness overwhelm himself when the thirst burnt his inside out. And the fear of being left in the cold alone again. It came back, sometimes. Rarely now since he started traveling with Geralt and the band. But he remembered.

He looked at the wine bottle and the wine lingered in it, suddenly felt regret. 

“I think the rest of the wine can wait for another time. The hour is late. Go back to the room, I will brew some tea that’d help your sleep.” And the hangover tomorrow morning. But he didn’t say it out loud.

“Are you telling me it’s bedtime? You? Lord Vampire? Who files off somewhere mysterious _every_ _night_? Please.” She laughed, stood up a little too fast and almost fell over. She steadied both of her hands on the back of the chair, standing in front of him, now looking like posing for a confrontation. Except it’s not. Because it can’t be and they both know it. 

They say knowledge is a curse. Perhaps in this case it is true; before you know it, even if you tell yourself it’s not possible, you’d still keep some secret hope. Now even the candle flame died down. Now it’s only dark.

_But can’t dark be full of beauty of a kind?_ A small voice says. The night is dark and full of terror, because they are yet unknown to us; we need but take courage, to implore, to discover. Gently and gradually, shapes would come out, lonely, sad, misunderstood gentle creatures of the darkness. 

_If only you will let me. If only I will let myself._

“I don’t want to sleep.” She squeezed the words out as Regis put her left arm around his neck and directed her slumbering body to her room. “I don’t want more dreams.”

“Don’t be afraid of the dreams. It happens that, at least scholars agreed thus so far, that humans need dreams biologically; it’s only healthy to dream. If they are those prophetic dreams, then, well, nothing changes no matter what you dream. And trust me, my tea will help.”

“I don’t want any tea! And why are you still here? Aren’t you supposed to be with your blonde succubus?” Rana scowled at Regis. She would have shouted if not for the drowsiness brought on by the alcohol. “Blonde. You told Geralt, damn it! You can’t spare the rest of us some insights?”

She knew she was not being reasonable, and she knew why, but she wanted an answer. She was disappointed in herself, for not being able to be seen as a confidant for him. She thought……

Regis said nothing, not with words nor his face. The refusal to explain only infuriated Rana more. She pushed Regis away, the force nearly threw her to the floor, but Regis caught her by the waist.

The explanation came. “She was an old friend.” He looked deeply into her eyes, for a moment, it almost seemed as though something would happen. Then the moment passed, he let her go to her bed, and went out for the tea.

Rana was already asleep when Regis brought her the tea. He set it underneath the night lamp, stood there for a moment, and went away, quietly, into the dark. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The epigraph is again a reference to the wonderful James Tiptree Jr.' quote.


	5. In Delay Lies Plenty

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Early winter's chilly air prompted both Rana and Regis to make a move, as they did, it almost seemed things would fall into their places for once. Almost.
> 
> *This chapter contains fluff and some mild smut  
> *Coughs AHEM there'll be more ahem smut in chapter 7

> _After Midinváerne, or Midwinter, the day of the winter solstice, the days grow longer. According to the[elves](http://witcher.wikia.com/wiki/Elf), Midinváerne marks the beginning of a new cycle: the sun gradually gains power and all things beneath it are born once again. Winter Shrines erected on this day celebrate the revival of life and light, but also honor the winter, as death and resurrection are two sides of the same coin._
> 
> **_Rites of Midnváerne_ **
> 
> _Beann'shies howl and shriek, and if you hear their cry, you can know you'll join the ranks of the dead that year._
> 
> beggar _from Dun Dâre_
> 
> _"To understand alchemy, you must understand two great truths. First truth: "As above, so below." Second truth: "Everything is one.”_
> 
> Master Jeremiah, **_Basics of Alchemy_**

****

The next day, winter was there.

Rana woke up in early morning with a dry throat. She found a cup of cold tea by her bedside table and drank it, liked the taste, but couldn’t be sure what was in it. She only vaguely remembered what happened last night, and the thought of her being drunk in front of Regis was like a burning sore, she grimaced in embarrassment.

It must have been really early, Rana hadn’t heard any court servants moving about, but something was already lit outside. A pale, yellowish light drew Rana to the terrace. When she opened the window, she realized it was the reflection of thick snow—there was already a few inches of it on the terrace, and it was still falling heavily without any intent to stop.

She stood there and thought for a moment. She remembered from yesterday’s breakfast gathering that the new year in this place was approaching; _saovine_? It sounded vaguely familiar to Rana, though she felt she had no reason to, since holidays in Night City for her meant like any other day—workdays. Besides, she had no one to celebrate with, anyway.

She remembered that year when she was very small, she and her brother spent three months in her Grandma’s place, somewhere norther, by the sea. It was the first time they had seen snow. Not as thick as it was here, but she remembered the awe as she watched tiny irregular snowflakes falling onto her hands, stranding for a second or two, then melted into her palm. That was the last year she had seen her Grandma.

A sudden chill called her back from her memory, and she realized she didn’t even take a shawl before coming out. _Best go back before some medieval sickness catches you._ She smiled as she shook her head in amusement and was about to step inside the room, her eyes, however, caught a small figure dressed in black, moving soundlessly along the snow-white pathway underneath the palace wing where she stayed. She moved forward and leaned over the balustrade to see clearer.

The figure stopped, quite omnisciently, and looked up.

Rana caught the shining catlike eyes and felt a flare of heat rising in her body. She wanted to go back, but the moment caught her and demanded her to stay stuck. She saw the small figure looked around, then vanished in a heartbeat, and before she finished thinking “is he going to materialize here,” Regis already appeared on the other side of the terrace. He looked, despite the rumor of his whereabouts, vigorously refreshed.

“Quite the first snow, wouldn’t you agree?” He spoke as he took off the hood, his black velvet cloak bellowed in the small wind. Behind him, Rana saw the first shade of white signaling the sunrise. She said nothing. She really wasn’t sure what would be the best to say, and somehow she felt the moment demanded her to say just the right thing, without knowing what it should be.

Seeing Rana wasn’t going to speak, Regis spoke again, this time, in a slightly embarrassed voice, “I apologize for my, hmm, sudden _landing_. But since we saw each other, it seemed rather against the protocol for me to simply walk away without due acknowledgement, and I didn’t want to disturb the dreams of the other ladies nearby. So, well, I suppose now it’s time I should be on my way back, if—” He broke off.

Rana was looking at him, simply looking at him.

His unexpected presence in this chilly daybreak seemed to her like a trance. A beautiful one. Snow was falling onto his cape, onto his shoulders, onto his greying hair, his pale face and his long and soft eyelashes. He no longer tried to brush off the snow, he stood there and let them fall.

A breathtaking trance. One she wished she’d never be waken from.

When finally she could speak, she couldn’t recognize her own voice. It was a whisper, almost unreal.

“Stay.”

In order to move from one side of this petite balcony to the other side, it would take exactly five steps, one must also be careful while navigating through the carafe, the wine cups and the chair strewn over the floor from last night’s indulgence. But they didn’t have the time. East of the sky, a line of sliver already broke over the top of Mount Gorgon. The night was coming to an end.

They both moved at the same time.

They moved carelessly though neither had been careless in their life, at least, not since a long time ago. Haunted by ghosts of the past, they had not wanted to lead themselves out of the prison, for it had been long and lonely and there was no one else, not since a long time ago. The hidden pain, the constrained emotions, the calculated moves; weapons against confronting the ghosts. Now there could be no more excuses under these gazes, which cleared up all the cautious doubts, pretentious contemplations and thoughtful misunderstandings.

The celestials collided.

They barely managed to scramble inside the room. She let him pin her in front of him by the waist, slid her own arms around his neck, slowly, unsurely, and tenderly. He responded, pulling her closer, slowly, unsurely, also, tenderly. His quickened breath mixed with the herbal aroma hit her like a powerful aphrodisiac. And they kissed. Then the kiss nourished other sensations—many other sensations—sensations they both thought they would never know, or never know again. 

The silence of the dawn was seething. In the fireplace, the remaining embers warmed up the room with its dimming glow. A piece of firewood cracked, and tiny stars exploded.

There was air to breathe, and there was each other. The cool skin that provided electrifying sensation with each touch on a new-found territory, the shining eyes that searched hungrily at the pictures lay in front of them, the memories entangled with the past, the fleeting pleasure and the enduring ones. Now all that gradually ceased to exist. Now there’s only the heat of their bodies against each other; moving, ever so gently, each and every action was carried out with care, as if not to wake up from a dream. 

Rana woke up, this time, by the touch of sunlight; maybe also by the draft of cold air of winter. She immediately turned around on her bed to see if it was really just a dream before dawn break—she found only crumpled bedsheet. No one was lying beside her.

She sat up, and sighed aloud in relief to see Regis standing in front of the window, closing it. She let her body sink back onto the pillows, which were put together as supports during certain play, and were now also crumpled. The tattered scene on bed drove a reminder, sending Rana another flourish of sensation between her legs.

Hearing the soft noise coming from the bed, Regis looked back. He was half-dressed and provided quite some sight. Morning’s early light flanked him from behind, and his unnaturally pale skin blended in with the crisp gleam, it looked for a second as though he was shining like crystals. Then he moved away from the window and hovered over Rana in a kiss. 

“You look good in white, you know.” Rana told Regis.

“Hmm? Oh, yes, the good chamberlain was considerably generous with the ducal wardrobe, yet with undergarments, well, I’m afraid you human simply lack the interest when it comes to what one can’t show off on a daily basis. It’s probably easy to notice, but I do prefer darker colors when it comes to clothing. Sadly, for now, like what our Angoulême likes to say, beggars can’t be choosers.”

She sighed and laughed, “I know, I know, You Grace are not the demanding type. No need to give me a lecture.”

Regis sat down on bed and leaned towards Rana closer. His fingers went up to play with the laces that held up her chemise in place, while his eyes suddenly found great interest on a pair of something. He spoke, not looking at her.

“Would you like me to _be_ demanding? I could certainly give you a lecture on something else…… I’ve quite a few subjects in mind.”

Those dexterous fingers worked their way gently and quickly. Something fell, then the fingers worked their way in. A gasp. A moan. A sigh.

He looked up. Growing ever darker, his eyes locked into hers. The onyx eyes that soon became everything.

“Now,” Rana sighed with absolute content, grabbed her chemise and got up, “We are definitely too late for _the_ breakfast. I don’t know you, but I’m famished after all those… activities.” She looked back at Regis, who was, totally unperturbed, laying over the pillow, wearing an amused expression. She picked up a piece of garment they threw on the ground earlier this morning and hurled at him with a plea, “Get up, will you?”

Regis laughed, too, and caught the projectile—her petticoat—adeptly, put it away, and got up.

“Since you are convicted about the ducal kitchen’s breakfast—not that I am otherwise. Besides, I have a feeling we’d better stay off from Angoulême’s curious eyes for a few days. I suppose we are headed for The Pheasantry?”

She hesitated, then replied, “No. Let’s not go to The Pheasantry. I’m sure it’s not the only tavern in this city.”

“No, it is not.” He studied her face, but didn’t ask anything. “Let’s go to the one near the Temple Cemetery.”

“Let’s.”

It was pleasantly cold outside. The air was crisp and they could see white fog forming when they spoke, but the winter’s wind has yet to touch this little duchy. As they walked their way down from the “better neighborhoods” to the Lassommoir district, they saw more and more stone steps decorated not by marvelous carvings and floral patterns, but by mangy guard dogs and sleeping cats, all taking advantage of the few hours of warm sunshine during the day. Some cats hissed as Regis passed by, but none felt jaunty enough to give up their spots of stretching under sunlight. And so, they walked on without accidents and reached the Temple Cemetery, Rana found the tiny tavern nearby among a series of identical buildings.

The tavern was marked by a wooden sign, crudely drawn, of something that looked like a fat man with a fox face. They went in and sat at a small table in the corner, but she couldn’t help and had to ask Regis what the berserker that thing on the sign was, to which Regis replied with the story of Reynard the Fox.

“I have always wondered, why human speak so fondly of those tales to their young. And paint such as this. Even if the animal was truly admirable to such extent, should any of you see a fox with human body, or even in human clothes, there’s bound to be a heartrending commotion over such monstrosity. And yet you scream at the sight of species that looked nothing apart from you save for the difference of the tip of an ear, or the shape of teeth.”

Rana let her eyebrows raise and fall, said, “Well, it is as you said, there’s fairytales and there’s monsters. No offense. But you must know it yourself, people are less easily scared by things written only in papers, at least, if they believe it’s only in papers. But some things are a lot more _tangible_ than tales.” She smiled at the memory and touch his arm across the table.

Regis smiled back in purse lips and put her hand in his. He spoke again.

“One might say that. Yet I’ve come across quite some people who feared the wrath of creatures and events that, at least to my knowledge, only existed in books written allegedly by some men with overfilled zeal hundreds of years ago.” He shook his head, bewildered by images from his own memory.

“You mean religious fanatics? I can’t really say about that. Where I came from, nobody really cared about God or gods by the time I was born, except… well, they are the fanatics. But I never had one cross my way, probably because I worked for the Corp……” She trailed off, going into her distant memories despite herself, thankfully Regis interrupted the process.

“ ‘Where I came from.’ You cannot be expecting no questions after mentioning that so many times. This place you are from, what was it really like?” He put his inquisitive eyes on Rana again.

Before Rana had time to riposte, the tavern’s help came in with a platter of food, so she had to promise Regis to tell him later, as was her custom to eat with as little conversation as possible. Her grandma taught her that, and made sure she remembered.

They had baguette with fish pâté, a side of hard cheese, and goat milk. The bread was a little stale and the pâté too salty, the goat milk tasted, well, like goats. But Rana ate as much as she could, while Regis barely touched anything, just looked at her and smiled. She wasn’t sure if she should feel more irritated or embarrassed, but she ate on anyway, feeling, actually, quite comfortable with his presence.

She had thought what it would be like to walk all the way from the ducal palace to this little tavern, to venture in public with Regis at her side. She had thought whether it’d be awkward, whether the open air would expose what could have been a mistake driven only by hidden animal instinct, whether they’d stay in silence until they arrive and spit out the undelayable “let’s just be friends” or “it was nothing this morning,” or worse, “I’m sorry.” But it was none of that. They walked side by side and talked, of small things, random things, the shades of the sky, the smells coming from a bakery and the coloring of a cat leering at them from someone’s roof. It was so natural and so familiar, like being with a friend she’s known for ages.

 _Except that it’s not. And you know it won’t be. Age is exactly what stands between you and him._ She thought and grew gloomy. She finished eating.

“Let’s go find a place to talk.”

The graveyard help swept the snow clean off the windy little path from the bridge all the way through the cemetery until it reached the chapel. There were flowers and offerings in front of some graves more fondly-remembered than other, and quite close to the center of the cemetery, two richly dressed women huddled over a gravestone, whispering. Rana and Regis, not wanting to disturb or be disturbed, sat down on a bench further away from them.

Rana sighed, studied the angles of the sinking sun, reluctant to start talking. And he smiled.

“Is this one of those times that you are going to say you’d tell me eventually instead of actually telling me?”

She sighed again, but couldn’t help a smile either, and disagreed, “No, I won’t be doing that anymore. From now on, when you ask, I will tell you as much as I can. Now that we have time to talk. Some time, anyway.”

And she really did tell him. She told him about the near depletion of resources, the growing and breaking of tensions among countries, the disasters and wars happened when her mom was a child, and the so-called Restoration by the few megatechcorporations that grew to be kings in her world. And she told him about her job, saving the selected Very Important Persons’ lives while looking away from a father with his three-year-old daughter in arms, needing only a few minutes of their attention and less than one of a trillion percentage of what they got in their medical quarters. She told him about the cold monster she had allowed herself to be and the shame she felt only in her dreams. She told him how she felt, waking up every now and then to face a windowless metal wall in her capsule apartment. But she also told him about the advances of their technologies, which sounded like magic in this world. She told him about the enigmatic Rockstars and their songs, about the roaring beats in their music that she had missed. She even dared herself to say that she wished he could see the never-sleeping Night City in its rainbow showers of digital lights, to see through bricks and metal into human flesh and feel the crazy pulsing of the heart that beat to survive and thrive in Night City, like Night City. There were a few times Regis had widened his dark eyes in disbelief, but he listened and didn’t say a single word until she stopped.

“I would,” Regis looked at Rana across the space between them, “in fact, I think I would like to see this world you came from. You made it sound like it promises of possibilities with no limit.”

“Oh but it has. Believe me.” She sighed and got up from the bench. “I see more people coming from the bridge. What is this? Is it a custom here to visit the graves before sunset, and everyone who slept over like us are now scrambling to finish the task?” She snorted at finishing her statement, blushed involuntarily at the memory of their “slept-over.” Regis snorted softly, too, but he went on to explain in a thoughtful tone.

“Ancient tales and folklores has it, that during the time of saovine, banshees, female elvish spirits, would come out and roam around graveyards, lament for those who would perish soon. I can’t remember it clearly, but I think it’s around the 870s to 890s that it became a tradition, human and elvish, that one pays homage to a deceased beloved before sundown so as to avoid the ill omen.” He paused, cutting her with his silhouette and teasing her with his darkening eyes. “Maybe we ought to follow the tradition and start heading back, before the darkness falls?”

She gave him a sidelong look and moved on anyway, towards the other gate of the Temple Cemetery. Smiling, knowing he followed.

The other cemetery looked much less interesting in terms of architecture and décor, for it had none. Sat between the Lebioda Gate and the lake, it’s practically outside the city, therefore deprived itself the bones and ashes of the wealthier citizens with longer family names. But it was thus also closer to the nature, and Rana rather liked the sight of bare branches and the still mirrorlike lake reflecting the snow-covered mountains as a backdrop of a quiet cemetery. Though it was only quiet comparing to the actual city, because there were actually more people visiting their relatives’ graves in here than in the more honored cemetery. Perhaps the lords and ladies had much work in those year-end parties and could found scarce time or mood to ponder on the past.

They spent the afternoon walking alongside the lake. Time went unnoticed in conversation until the glare of a setting sun echoed over the lake reminded them.

“Shall we go back before dark?” Regis asked a second time.

“I thought you are only afraid of werewolves.” She laughed, ignoring Regis’ deadpan expression, “I mean, you can’t be actually worried about some ghost stories, right? After all, you are a vam—” She broke up, looked around to make sure nobody heard her, and continued, more seriously this time.

“After all, you are so…… _We_ are so incapable and ineffective compared to you, _we_ are right to be afraid of the unknown. But you, who lived so long and seen so much?”

Regis sighed. He had his back to Rana, for he was looking at the sun, drooping, ever lower into the range of mountains.

“Believe me, there are some things unknown that even I wouldn’t dare to trifle with.”

“Like what?” She stepped closer and leaned against his shoulder, to watch the setting sun with him.

The sunset glazed auburn, burning, with every blink, a little bit fainter, until finally it was absorbed solely by the mountain ridge, leaving a bloody afterglow. Above the mountains and where the sun had been just a moment earlier, colossal of dark clouds rolled.

Rana shuddered. And with great astonishment, she felt the shoulder she’s been leaning against shuddered, too. She looked at him and called his name. He looked back, his eyes glimmered in the dusk, so infinitely dark, like the windless lake in front of them. They were so beautiful that Rana felt her heart would burst into tears-- if she could. She recalled the screams in her dreams, and waited.

“Like Destiny.” Regis whispered. Now his eyes, still dark and boundless, shone with acquiesce of his fate, yet with such undulating warmth in them, Rana rejoiced and pulled him tight into her embrace instead, forgetting the dreams.

A moment earlier, after the sky was just painted by the sunset’s flame, a banshee howled and wept, but Rana didn’t hear it. She couldn’t have, for it wasn’t for her. 


	6. Interlude

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "So how did she ended up here, really?"

Cold, violent green lights whooshed and pulsed away in a dead-end alley where two figures stood: a girl, or maybe it was a young woman, and a tall, slender man.

“What the hell was that!? What did you do? She was a friend!” The girl spitted out her words, barely suppressed her will to yell and demand. Her body shook with rage and shock, even her ashen hair was tremoring slightly, strands of enchanted light pulses springing into different directions in the rain, like drops of drizzle on an umbrella. 

The man replied with a flat voice, “What I _knew_ I must. Let’s not draw even more unnecessary attention. Come this way, please.” Under the façade of this calmness, he exuded an emotionless, calculative prowess that yielded obedience even from lionesses, at least, when within reasons.

“I will need an explanation.” The girl’s green eyes flashed.

“As you wish, but later.” He did not grab the girl’s arms to take her into his direction, which he _knew_ was where they had to be; he didn’t even touch her – he merely gestured with his arm and waited. The girl clenched her fists and grimaced, just as she was about to say something, the man spoke again, “She is safe, no need to worry yourself.” Then, in a tone that’s lower and softer, “I promise you this.” The green-eyed girl’s eyes stopped flashing and -- without taking off her grimace completely -- she strode out from the dark alley with him closely following, into the neon lights lit streets, into the night, and into another unknown direction.

In the alley, there was only the muddy dumpster and some lousy anti-Corporate graffiti; no trace of what or who happened. In a moment, some of its natural inhabitants would return, first stray cats, organic and not, then homeless junkies and underground business one-dealers. In this world, like most worlds, no one notices when one of its inhabitant stops being in this world; whether the inhabitant disappears in the ultimate sense, or happens on another world, it makes no difference. This world is simply busy raining.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alright I have posted this before but as I kept writing I realized this is probably a better place to put it, so, here.   
> It's a "what happened before" kind of flashback scene. And in case I was really bad at describing the characters, it's Ciri and Avallac'h, in Cyberpunk 2077 universe.


	7. Awakening

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "She was riding waves in a storm. Hot, and wet."  
> Moments spent between lovers in flickering candlelight, before the inevitable waking up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ! Smut alert.  
> I wrote some I thought was smut in the last chapter. My partner read it and was like "nah it's water fluffs," which, in last chapter's case, was pretty ok and in fact I wanted it to be not about hot lemon but the characters' relationship.  
> One of my favorite collection in the witcher fandom was actually, yes, a collection of witcher character/reader fluff + smuts. I really liked the author's way of writing, how she/he/they show the scenes and very importantly, how the sex act was laid out. And there's some real steamy moments that made me like "wow I wish I can write something that makes people blush, too>:)"  
> And I think it is an amazing thing to do, to write and make people **feel**. So I challenged myself to try writing some smut that maybe I want to read since I wasn't very comfortable before. I hope this is not too bad.  
> Bon Appétit;)

> _Verily do I tell you, that whoever believes in dreams is as one who wants to catch the wind or is grasping at shadows. He is deluded by a beguiling picture, a warped looking glass, which lies or utters absurdities in the manners of a woman in labor. Foolish indeed is he who lends credence to the dream and treads the path of delusion. Nonetheless, whoever disdains and not believe them at all, also acts unwisely. For if dreams had no importance whatsoever, why then would the Gods in creating us, give us the ability to dream?_
> 
> _The Wisdom of the Prophet Lebioda_ , 34: 1

The heat between them was almost unbearable as Rana balled the bed frame in her fist, hard.

Behind her, Regis delved in deeper, hands clutching her hips. Everything was tightening, the fervor closed in, cornered her, forced her to squirm, to moan, to scream. She cried out, begged, and tried in vain to lean further down, to push back. But the hands held her, firm; as was the now excruciatingly slow rhythm, refusing to release her just yet. He leaned over, kissed her in the neck very suddenly; too suddenly. She shuddered involuntarily and tensed up.

Something brushed between her thighs. His fingers.

_Oh how he uses them._

She felt that little bundle of nerves searing, splitting her open and demanding her to feel – everything. Him, thick and heavy, throbbing inside her, while his fingers continued to unravel the knot in her belly. She wanted to howl, but the air froze in her throat, she opened her mouth in a soundless call, and……

Zero. The white light after explosion.

She was riding waves in a storm. It was restless, it was heedless. It was wet. Now the lightings have passed, now the cauldron has stopped seething. Now the senses were returning to her and she started to see again. To see……

 _Regis_. 

Pale and dark, cool and warm; hard and soft.

Regis planted a few kisses on Rana’s shoulder and whispered in her ear.

“I’m not finished yet.”

He withdrew, unhurriedly – almost reluctantly – and laid her down on the bed, facing him. He gathered both of her legs in one strong grip, the other hand went to cup her face. She turned her head and caught him, her tongue went over his dexterous fingers, sucked on his thumb, tasting him; tasting herself. He hissed, pulled her hips higher, closer, sped up his thrusts, until there’s nothing else but her moans, unable to be restrained, echoing in the room. 

When it’s all finished, he came down and lay beside her. She heard his quickened breath and felt the warmth sliding down along her thigh, sighed in satisfaction and hugged him.

Regis sat up against the headboard and placed Rana’s head gently on his lap. During this short and magical month they’d been together, he had developed this habit of caressing her shoulder and neck afterwards, and she had developed this habit of surrendering her body and mind to his fingers. She usually fell asleep during the massage.

These kind of nights kept those vivid dream from her, and she was grateful, even though in the back of her mind she knew they were still there, lurking in the path towards future.

Rana heard Regis cursed under his breath and looked up, his face was a strange mixture of flush, worry, and guilt.

“What happened?” She tried to sit up, and understood.

“How could I be so careless?” Eyes full of regret, Regis damned himself. He carefully run a finger along where her left leg joined her buttock, red marks bloomed there, and she sensed pain even with his gentle touch. But she didn’t let herself react, not even a hiss. _He had enough to guilt trip himself with._ Instead, she looked up and smiled, rolling her eyes over and made a funny face. _It’s alright._ The look said. _Can’t be all sunshine and flowers, I know that and I still…… want you._

She knew, it was always so. For her it’s always too much and for him it’s too little. Of course they have found the happy medium. Many, many times. But she knew even then, at the time of his release he’s still holding back, and even then, her body still ended up with bruises, red and blue.

She also knew, that he’s still having those midnight secret meetings; at least, she thought she knew. In the nights she woke up before morning dawned, she would find the bed empty.

_“She’s an old friend.”_

She understood: she also had _old friends_ before. For Rana, it really was the time they were together that mattered, she stopped caring about his _old friends_ after that morning they shared. After all, neither had tried to initiate _the_ conversation yet. What do they mean to each other? So little and so much more than what they could express. Why try and risk spoiling it when you can avoid it? So they didn't. They avoided certain topics gingerly, to preserve a dream.

However beautiful the dream was, it was still a dream, and neither wanted to speed up the awakening. Not yet. 

Most men Rana spent one or two nights with emitted humid hotness during those nights; she couldn’t say she really hated it but she never liked it much either. Regis did not emit humid hotness. His skin was cool and slightly dry, it reminded her of the old bamboo sheets she slept on during hot summers in her grandma’s house. And he smelled like it, too. When he’s naked, stripped off of the deception game, he smelled soft, woody, and ozonic; a faint, metallic sweetness. She ravished the scent, storing it up for memories.

“What’s this?” Regis asked. He turned and supported himself on one elbow, stroking her thigh as one would to a cat.

“This?” Rana touched a tiny thin round-shape patch on her left thigh, “It’s for birth control.”

“Is it, really?” Regis, interest piqued, sat up, “Are you telling me where you came from, humans have mastered the art of hormonal regulation and contained it in such a minute device?” He paused for a little and continued, “If hypothetically, you happen to just have more of this device with you at the moment, I would very much like to extract a small piece, for academic reasons, of course.”

Seeing the mannerism of a scholar Regis budding, his eyes sparked from excitement, Rana laughed, but she had to put out his enthusiasm unwillingly, “It happens that I don’t. Each lasts for a year, and I just got this before I…came here. I didn’t know I’d need more. Very unfortunately, for the academia, the woman population of this place, and for me.”

Regis sighed and fell back onto the bed, closed his left arm around Rana. He looked at the fireside, and in reflection, his eyes, glazed with fire, shone with the splendor of cinnabar crystals; rich, abysmal.

An ember bursted in the fireplace, sending sparks above, sparks which were gone in an instant.

“Would you not like to have some sort of inheritance be left in this world, while you would be gone, eventually and irrevocably?” He asked. His voice was soft as velvet, yet something in it made it so that it fitted into the dark of this night. The winds of winter swiped everything clean, even in the royal palace. Bare branches stood tall, stretching their reedy limbs into the sky, on which, a thousand stars blinked. 

“What do you mean?”

“Biological legacy, as a friend of mine used to say. Given the length of human life, it only seems reasonable.”

“You mean kids?” She looked at him, dead serious, “Do I want to have kids, expecting that they would serve as extensions of myself, wishing that after my pathetically short human life ended I would still exist by memory, in them?” She closed her eyes.

“No. I remember my mother, and I don’t want to be remembered in any way similar to that.”

“For over a thousand years, the elder races were slowly driven into reservations, even extinction in this land, while human alone thrived. To clarify, I say this without conviction, even though my people’s activities are also fundamentally limited by human expansion.”

“I don’t really care either way.” Rana nodded mindlessly.

Regis smiled. “I always thought that was the most fascinating aspect of the human psyche. You live so short and die so easily, yet you persist. The elves thought they could wait you out like waiting out a plague or a year of bad crops; given the evidence, I think they thought wrong. You will survive everything that you will bring upon yourselves, and the secret lies in your ability to procreate. And I didn’t mean it as how you had put it earlier. What you pass on is more than a mere extension of yourselves, a few traits of the two parents, of a whole family. Even the royal blood of great Houses, means nothing standing in front of time itself. Time swallows everything and diminishes its purpose, yet, don’t we all find solace in knowing that to give life, to look at your creation in the eyes and know that they, too, one day, might do the same thing or have the same doubt, yet nonetheless find a way to walk through everything and live on.” He spoke dreamily, tracing the muscular contour of her belly. It made her nervous.

“You are philosophizing the mundane again. It’s just a biological function, nothing more. Time has nothing to do with it.” She hesitated then added, “I would have nothing to do with it, either. Maybe it is really a noble and beautiful dream, but it’s not mine.” She looked at him with pleading defiance and saw those dark eyes spoke the truth she didn’t want to hear. _It is mine._ Those eyes said. _It is mine and I’m starting to think it’d never come true._ _When I perish, I will be gone forever. For me, it is too late._

Rana dropped her gaze. Desperate to shake off the premonition, she snuggled up against his chest – something she never did before.

“How do you know Geralt will leave here? You sounded so sure when you and Ms. Vigo were arguing this morning.”

“I, for one, wasn’t arguing, merely stated some facts.” Regis puffed.

She liked him like that. So utterly absorbed in his own argument, his own philosophy. In fact, she thought that was the only time when he’d be selfish enough to absorb himself in his own matters instead of everyone else’s.

“Do you really wish to leave?” She couldn’t hold back the question she wanted to ask long ago, though, like a hopeless man, she knew the reply before the question was voiced.

“I know we will.” His voice was low and composed; lower than usual, yet not more composed.

For some time they stayed in silence, in the contentment after the steamy and dreamy lovemaking earlier, the contentment now like sand slipping through an hourglass, with each moment becoming less stable and filled with increasing anxiety.

“Regis.” She spoke, her voice was dull and flat. “I’m going to stay.” There. The traitor. “I have to make a decision, right? Even though it’s a coward’s decision.” Now come at me, your false comfort and meaningful looks. Now it’s the chance to let out your shock, your disappointment, your doubt, your disgust, to one that betrays so easily, in the face of mere mortality, which occurs naturally in a few decades anyway.

Yet she found none from Regis. He spoke almost at once and his eyes mirrored her guilt. “Choosing to face the monotony of living is never cowardice. Trust me, I’d know.” He stopped and struggled for a moment, then spoke, with some effort. “I would like to think I have that courage, too. But I need to do right by this first.”

“If I ask, will you stay?”

“I made a promise.”

He dropped his eyes, unable to look at her, and she understood.

“It’s alright. I didn’t expect anything.” She laughed drily, “The girl is not going to find herself, is she? You gotta do what you gotta do and that’s that.”

“Have you never thought there could be a link between your appearance here and Cirilla? After all, according to what you told me, you only came upon this world because of – what seems like – a portal she opened. Don’t you think she might be able to send you back to your world? Don’t you want to go back? To your world?”

“It’s never my world, I just lived there. It’s not the place that attaches itself to me nor the other way around, it’s what’s in the place, and who.”

“I think I understand.” Regis brought her hand to his lips and kissed it softly. A touch that scorched her skin and filled her with guilt and remorse. And desire. If only she had been someone else in the past life, if only she had learned how to protect. Once again she would have to be a bystander, look at others while they challenge fate, and hope only in a superficial weakness that fate would be kind.

“It would seem the best option, truly, if not the only option, for you to stay. Don’t ruminate it for it is not in our hands to change.” He flipped her hand underneath his and gently squeezed it. “It had been a beautiful dream, in fact, so beautiful that I think we both yielded too eagerly to our entrenched positions; in our dreams, the novelties and dissonances only added the glamour of this façade, we forgot that it is only in retrospect, after we wake up will we realize how nonsensical and inaccessible our dreams are.”

“Then this will be a dream hard to forget.” She sighed and pulled him close. Closer, then too close.

“Dream a little longer with me.”

“ ‘Only in darkness the light.’ ”

 _Who is it?_ She thinks with a sense of relief. She didn’t know why relief, maybe it’s the sound. It sounds like someone she knows.

She is in one of _those_ _dreams_ again. She notices whenever she has dreams that speaks of something other than a recollection and piecing-togethers of events during the day, it’s never from _her_ eyes. Not even third-person about her actually. It’s always about what she’s to see.

Tonight she is in a bird’s eye. She knows this because she feels the wind underneath her wings and hears the rustlings of the trees. She’s flying over a forest and she’s too high to see anything besides leaves. _So densely green._ She feels light and cheerful. The weather is nice. Warm. Clear.

She soars a little higher and dives down to a small clearing in the forest when she spots a small spring. Her reflection in the water is a large black bird with small beady eyes and curvy beak. A raven? Or maybe a crow. She doesn't care. She suddenly remembers she is looking for food.

She turns her little head and looks around. There’s a small wooden shack nearby – a sign of human activity despite the lack of human sound in the close vicinity, meaning a good chance of actually getting fattening food. And indeed there’s a small garden of sorts with several things growing out of it. She is disappointed after flying over and looks more closely in the garden, which mostly consists of lean and mangy herbs. She wets her tongue in the expectations to find those golden round-bellied plants—people are too occupied by their wars and stop to sow—she hasn’t had them for a while. She nevertheless does not waste this hunt and helps herself with a reddish juicy berry. The berry has thin skin that is easy to tear apart, it has some seeds inside but soft; not too sweet, she’ll probably need another one to get more energy, although this berry _is a_ lot bigger than those she saw before……

She is not pleased to be interrupted by some rustling noise coming from the forest and reluctant to leave her juicy game behind. But, _safety first_ , as they tell you time and again before you can even fly. So, she flaps her wings and flies up.

She sees the noise walks out from the shadows of the trees and into the clearing. A grizzled man dressed in grayish-black colors with something strapped over the shoulder. He walks very slowly, but lighter than how she remembers humans usually walk. He looks at the herbs swaying in the garden and paused.

His eyes sank in his dark eye sockets, his features gaunt. He looks like a tired human. Yet his eyes, jet black, glows with an inexplicable hopefulness, and, dare she say, with happiness? 

Then she flies away, into the empty sky.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So sorry I haven't updated this for a while. It's not "writer's block" because I personally don't believe in it; I believe there's always a reason if one couldn't finish a story or keep writing. I think in this case, I actually feel reluctant to leave my "shitty 2 crown romance" here, I guess by not finishing it I'd feel like my characters just have so much more possibilities waiting ahead? Burrr. Anyway. 
> 
> Also, because I had this idea a bit before New Year to write about what happened with Lara Dorren. I WAS OBSESSED WITH, well, the whole Witcher universe + lore, but I think my biggest obsession (besides Regis and their vamp society ahahhaha *coughs and hides away) is the legend of Lara Dorren and Cregennan of Lod. Several things reminded me of The Seagull by Chekhov. And of course, the tragedy involving Falka, Cerro, and the political intrigues more than a hundred years ago before Geralt and Ciri's story; it just feels like so ripe with materials to build things from. Besides, I will have a chance to insert my favorite vamp Regis (coz he was alive back then HA)...... 
> 
> I'm putting [a link](https://archiveofourown.org/works/17598713) to the Lara story; it'd be just a trailer because I haven't finished the opening chapter. But if anyone's interested, keep an eye on it because I'm closing this one off and will be focusing on that very soon:3
> 
> Thank you for reading, as always. And kudos/ comments will be loved. :3


	8. Something Ends

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What will be, will be. Little granule cannot work against the wheel of Destiny.  
> So it seems.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here's [a link ](https://witcher.fandom.com/wiki/Something_Ends,_Something_Begins_\(unofficial_translation\))to the short story of Geralt and Yen's wedding, by Sapkowski himself. It's non-canon but I loved it to bits anyway.

> ‘Life,’ repeated the knight thoughtfully. ‘How is it again, Master Dandelion? Something begins, or something ends?’
> 
> Dandelion shot a short, inquisitive look at him.
> 
> ‘No, I don't know,’ he replied. ‘And if I don't know, then no one does. The conclusion is that nothing ever ends and nothing ever begins.’
> 
> \---- Something Ends, Something Begins

Rana had thought she wouldn’t be able to do it, that when the time of parting came, she wouldn’t be able to cope with it so she’d choose to not show up at all. But she did. They stood outside the city, on the hill, by the columns. Winds picked up, and the sky was growing dim.

She gave Milva two dozen broadhead arrows with goose fletching, which costed almost everything she saved by selling jewels bestowed on her by the Duchess. She put a pompom woolen hat on Angouleme’s head, tucked it tighter, and handed Cahir sweet bread filled with a paste made of poppy seeds, rolled up in Vicovarian fashion. She felt a little foolish, giving a grown man titbits, but she didn’t know him enough to give him a better gift. As Cahir took over the sweet rolls, he blushed faintly, thanked her, and she saw in his eyes something moist glistened.

After Dandelion rushed over to bid the company farewell and pass on his financial support confiscated from the private ducal pocket, they all hugged and decided it was time for both the leaving and the staying to ride on. Rana held Regis close for the last time and let the herbal scent flooded her.

“When this is finished, I’d like to go to Fen Carn in the summer. Come with me.”

His limitlessly gentle eyes told her what she wanted to hear. And despite knowing that it might be a lie, willingly or not, she smiled.

She leaped onto the horse and let Dandelion lead. Before they both tugged at the reins and spurred their horses, she turned back and yelled at their fair-haired street urchin.

“Hey, Angouleme!”

“What?”

“That brothel you want to open when you come back, I will fund it for sure if you let me decide on one thing.”

“What?”

“Ville de Nuit is a better name than your Lolloping Trollop.”

Despite the jokes, wishes, and promises they had exchanged when they parted, Rana felt heavy when they returned to the palace. Neither she nor Dandelion spoke much, but before they left, she to her little room and Dandelion to the royal bedchamber, they shook hands and traded words of comfort. _Like nothing’s going to happen_. She swallowed what shouldn’t be said, what shouldn’t even be allowed to be thought about. In another plane, where fairy tales do end with a happy ending for everyone, she wouldn’t have to. But this is not that plane.

The bells in Beauclair tolled twelve. Rana poured water over the embers in the fireplace and blew out the candles before she went to bed. But she didn’t fall asleep until after a very long time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ville de Nuit can be translated as "Night City"


	9. Spring

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Spring will return, on the road the rain will fall  
> Hearts will be warmed by the heat of the sun  
> It must be thus, for fire still smolders in us all  
> An eternal fire, hope for each one  
> \--Dandelion, Winter, or, The Eternal Fire

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This has some info from Blood and Wine DLC, but the timeline is truncated to fit this fanfic better.  
> In B&W, Regis said he has known Dettlaff since he was a youngster and they kinda had a fallout because Dettlaff wasn't a party vamp punk  
> Also, Stygga castle was destoryed shortly after Geralt, Yen, Ciri had left, by the order of our madam Owl Philippa Eilhart.  
> I brought Regis' narration back because at the beginning of this fic it started with his voice, so I guess it would only be conclusive that he'd be there when it ended.

He had not expected traversing in traditional means would be _this_ taxing.

It’s been about a year since he had returned to the living. Him, Emiel Regis Rohellec Terzieff-Godefroy of the Gharasham tribe, was reduced into a smear by the hands of a human mage, in defense of two other humans. What a lousy example of a vampire.

Even lousier, Regis had to really try to convince himself that how he had come so close to being expired forever, was because he’s out to save. He ought to have done just that, oughtn’t he? _The day you die should have been a day to remember, shouldn’t it?_ But in truth, his memories of that day was a haze. All he remembered was the sight of a raven-haired woman screaming in midair while Vilgefortz laughed with white froth foaming at his mouth, and Geralt, scrambling up from a pile of rubble, bloodied and bruised.

He recognized Geralt. And remembered that he was there to defend his friends, who died one by one anyway. He failed them all. They fought and bled their lives while he went on a killing spree in all the wrong places, drunk. Drunk with human blood and the false promise of power. He had forgotten about everything until he saw Geralt again.

Then he misjudged the power a human could possess in their finity and died by it. Humiliatingly and horribly. The hot then the cold. He was stranded in a sea of darkness and terror that stretched on into an eternal nothingness.

Until a familiar scent came and led him away.

A familiar scent, and taste. Blood. His blood? He had no idea and there was nothing for him to do any reasoning. He drank, greedily, from the something out of nothing. He’d do anything at that point, as long as he could **_do_** again.

Quickly, he remembered what was life. The throbbing, unrelenting heartbeat of life resounded in his chest again. He was a hollowed shell, but he _was_ again. And in his half-consciousness, he saw a face he had known in his last life, hard lines and soft blue eyes.

“Who…Dettlaff?”

Those blue eyes flickered. “It is. But don’t spend your energy yet. Recover. We shall speak soon. Once we are back in my hideout.”

Regis groaned grudgingly, unwilling to comply. He mustered all he could and, in his opinion, spoke; though in truth he was barely making a noise.

“Anyone? G…Geralt?” He fainted before he could finish the sentence.

Regis hardly remembered how they got to Dettlaff’s home in Nazair, he spent the first month in a state of feverish hallucination.

One moment he was with his cryptmates, chasing a few screaming humans in a game in someone’s crypt – not his, next the screaming became Rana’s. She’s having one of those dreams again. The night was fresh, the fire in the fireplace had almost gone out. He pulled the blanket over her and got up to put more logs in the fire, but the fire, somehow engorged like a dragon. It extended its ghastly claw, and he felt the breath of death. Somewhere someone was laughing hysterically, someone yelled and cursed. Someone yet shrieked so horribly that the glass shattered and fell onto him. Who was screaming?

Blood, so much blood.

 _You have a debt to pay, raven. You who drank blood shall pay in blood. Your blood, for the blood of the Alder._ Silver hair, emerald eyes.

 _I’m not in the habits of leaving a comrade in need._ Witcher? No, Geralt.

 _When this is finished, I’d like to go to Fen Carn in the summer. Come with me._ The strange purple eyes shone; Rana’s eyes. Her lips were trembling. Winds tousled her hair. He reached out to cradle her face, and everything fell into black.

When Regis woke up, a pair of pale blue eyes was waiting; kind, concerned eyes. Something was very sad in its depth.

He tried to sit up and failed. Blue-eyes brought him water. He didn’t realize how thirsty he was until he drank.

“Thank you.” He said when he had emptied the cup. “I am forever in your debt, Dettlaff.”

“Don’t mention it.”

“How long since……”

“Thirty-two days. You were raving most of the time, I was worried that something had gone wrong, due to my lack of experience in…hmm, reviving our kind.”

Thirty-two days. So the stone was turned and the fate was set. Whatever had come to pass in Stygga, now simply was.

“Did you find anyone at where you found me?” Regis asked, after a moment of hesitation.

“I didn’t find any- _thing_. I was drawn by an explosion in the area, when I got there, there was nothing besides a few rubbles. I caught your scent, but you were buried underground.”

“Buried? So someone had made it.” Geralt. His Cirilla, too, perhaps. It must have been so. Who else would care for a bubbling stain melted into glass and stone?

Dettlaff’s curious eyes prodded him to explain.

“I was there with several others, to rescue someone.” He related his encounter with Geralt and the whole hanse, omitting very few details only. Dettlaff raised an eyebrow when he heard Regis has befriended a witcher, but he refrained from commenting. _Ever so reticent, just like years ago. It would seem he hadn’t changed. While I…… Perhaps it’s the same with me? I am still that sorry excuse of a vampire. Mingling in the business of human and witcher, getting myself blasted following a massacre by my own hands, while drunk……_

“I think I do understand.” To his surprise, Dettlaff sighed deeply and remained silent for a long time.

“Three years ago, I met someone. A woman. She went missing just after last Saovine. I’ve been searching for her since. It's probably the only reason I'd came across you at that hour. I had nowhere else to be.”

Regis looked at Dettlaff, appreciating him disclosing something so near his heart. Yet he was suddenly lost with words. Quite unlike him, really. But after all that happened, who could blame him? There were occasions where words were simply too dispensable. 

In the end, after a day and a night’s contemplation, he offered.

“I would be gladly, that is, if you would like me to, if you would permit, I mean, if you don’t mind – ”

“Speak freely, my friend.” Dettlaff seemed amused by the usually-eloquent vampire's incoherent speech.

“I would like to offer you my company and my aid in searching for your Rhenawedd.”

Dettlaff was visibly moved. He sat down beside the little cot Regis was lying on and spoke.

“I thank you for the sincerity. But I – ”

“Then there’s no buts. It is settled. Once I recover, I would have to tend to one other matter – but I believe it shan’t take me any time at all – then we will set off to search for your damsel-in-distress. Hopefully, with one more company in tow.” He couldn’t hide his smile at the thought.

Dettlaff’s curious eyes prodded him on yet again.

“You see, my friend, I have also met someone.”

Once the news of the Peace Treaty of Cintra reached Nazair, Regis started to absorb himself even more thoroughly with regenerating. As soon as he could finally stand and walk, he bid Dettlaff farewell and set off for Sodden.

He rode on horseback for months and with some reluctant yet necessary intervals of having to stay in a tavern, or luckier, an inn, he passed into Rivendell and started trekking through the forest.

The journey tired Regis, and realizing that was certainly a blow to his pride.

He knew he was still recovering, and Dettlaff had voiced his concern for him to venture out so soon, where he had to be amidst human and be careful with the deception game again, but he dared to try his luck and counted on his vampiric nature to save him the humility of constant fatigue after half a day’s riding – not to mention walking a few miles on foot. Luck was not with him in this case and each extra day he spent in traveling brought him a bit more anxiety. He grew uncertain of his decision sometimes.

After all, he was supposed to be dead, wasn’t he? Wouldn’t it be right for… _her_ , to move on? To start a new life? What they shared was beautiful, but did it ever spark any promises for either one of them? What right did he have to assume she would actually be waiting? And if so, how could he know she’d be there, in his shabby cottage at Fen Carn, an abandoned cemetery? Worse still, there’s the possibility of her being hurt, his imagination could almost picture it, on her way trying to reach him, _them;_ or trying to get here, through a land licking its wound from war. Rabid dogs bit just as hard as irate and grief-stricken people, having lost all they had. He could not bear the thought of losing yet another member of his pack; not her. The thought alone pushed him keep on moving.

By the time he passed the fork where Chotla river joined Ina by the now abandoned fortress of Armeria, the moon was already climbing the sky. A full moon. Too bad he’s too weak to fly. He had almost forgotten what it felt like to glide under the masquerade of night.

The Cintrian Army took whatever they could with them when they retreated and the area stood in silence, not even birds sang, only a few nocturnal rodents scurried across the field where the camp was set a few months ago.

The sight reminded Regis of that fateful night, when he had disclosed his true identity to those who came to call comrades and friends, and the memories brought another gush of emotion crushing into his chest. He felt heavy; too heavy all of a sudden. He had to come down from the bay and steady his head leaning against a tree. It seemed he had best camp in the fortress tonight.

He could not fall asleep until almost the break of dawn, but he allowed himself to relax under the cool breeze, mixed in with the subtle smell of hornbeam leaves, only perceptible to his vampiric nose, like those of the Canids’ in picking up elusive scents, and let his nose being tickled by the occasional catkins from the hornbeams. _It’s spring already_.

Somewhere further down the road, Regis sensed the fragrance of evening primroses, buttercups, and lupines budding under the moonlight. He imagined and saw quite a peaceful sight. He sighed and let his thoughts drift away the wings of night’s air, where the wild flowers bloomed.

Rana reeled in the scent of cinnamon, sage, wormwood, and anise. _I used too much cinnamon for tea this past month, my protective charm’s waning already._ She thought. _Time for a trip to Dillingen._

Outside of the cottage, there were signs of fresh rain. Buttercups and lupines bloomed amidst wild grasses, which were decorated with tiny raindrops. The little fountain not far from the cottage glistened like a huge diamond under the angles of a morning sun.

“Looks like spring.” She muttered.

It’s been almost a little more than a year since she rode off to Fen Carn, last time she had spoken to anyone besides herself was five months ago, when she was in Brugge, getting provisions for wintering. She had long stopped caring of her own insanity when she found herself mumbling her opinions while reading some scrolls written by clearly deranged scholars with no interlocutor around: she’s deep in the wilderness, living by an abandoned elven cemetery, with only some perches she farmed in the fountain; she’s practically a hermit, why resist the stereotypes?

A little more than a year ago, as soon as the snow stopped, Rana excused herself from the patronage of Duchess Anna Henrietta, with the help of a Viscount Julian Alfred Pankratz de Lettenhove, may his favor lasts as long as his infamy being the “paragon of virtue”, and left Toussaint on a thoroughbred Nilfgaardian stallion, which she traded for two full pouches of coin in Brugge, just before turning to the Old Road. The horse being black clearly helped a great deal, as the locals were obsessed with vampire legends and, “everyone knows,” black horses were the best detectors of vampire graves.

Rana knew the horse would be a good company when she arrived at Fen Carn, but she dared not try her luck: she can easily spot any movements with her Eagle 2.0 bionic eyes, hiding herself would be less of a problem, but a horse could expose her. Besides, even though Dandelion had helped her to get some supplies before she left Toussaint, she had no idea how long she would actually stay in Fen Carn, there could never be too much coin in her situation.

That winter in Toussaint, at first she was deeply troubled.

After Regis and the others left, she dreamed many strange things. Stranger though, she stopped dreaming about the screaming in that ominous icy castle. She wasn’t able to enter the castle, even though she tried a few times, in her own initiative, and with some overly enthusiastic help of Fringilla Vigo, who probably had her own agenda. But no measures proved potent enough to enable the dreams, and she gradually stopped trying and stopped worrying.

I had always been worrying about something. She thought. My mom. My brother. Where’s next meal. Is my client happy. When I came here, first I worried similar things, who to scheme with or against so I can survive, but something’s changed. I stopped worrying about tomorrow and started living. A familiar face appeared in her memory, lips moving, silky voice philosophizing, comforting, “People don't think about the present. They usually remember old times or worry about the future.” She smiled. He helped me, with his philosophizing and smiling and velvety voice; he was an unruffled ocean, unfathomable yet forever calm, on it, I was able to finally set sail.

However, Rana did not give herself entirely to illusions. She knew the mission had a high stake and much was to overcome if they wanted a happy ending. She did not think those dreams of the castle had no meanings at all – she shouldn’t have dreamed it repeatedly if they were, but she also remembered that dream she had just before Regis left.

He looked terrible in that dream, but she knew it’s him. It had to be.

And so here she was, living the dream of her life, only in a literal way. Not to cast it in any negative light though; Rana liked cities, but this life in the woods, she managed to get used to. For she hoped she could live the dream of her life eventually, and not in a literal way, but that involves serendipity, and as everyone knew, serendipity requires patience.

She had not much with her, but there’s still plenty of hope. And the thought of hope pushed her keep on waiting, for a day of reuion. 

The scents of buttercups, lupines, and to some others, primroses, saturated the air with a pleasant sweetness. The nightly mist that enveloped the forest was being driven away by the rays of the sun, it’s another morning.

Rana had already finished washing up and packed light for the trip. She was about to open the door when she heard the faint sound of and horse snorting.

She clenched the bag so tight that the coins inside started to hurt her palm. She pressed herself on the door. _Wait, use your senses and reason. Don’t misjudge. You’ve come a long way. Don’t lose your head now._

She had to reason first before jumping out from the cottage to shout and confirm her suspicion. _But maybe it is precisely now that I should lose my head to? Is this not the moment we’ve been waiting for all these time?_

Who else would come on a single horse, at this hour, to an elven cemetery, a place where even the long-lived aen Seidhde had handed on to oblivion?

This is a place for the ones forgotten. And aren’t they precisely just that? The story of their adventures was being written and had been written, their parts in this universe’s affair were done. Now they were ready to be forgotten and to be remembered later with their lives altered and deeds embellished. For now, under the guise of fairytales, the heroes and heroines can finally pass onto a happily-ever-after.

She opened the door. And there he was, a dozen steps away from the cottage. A bay horse stood even a little further away, happy to escape from the smells that tickled her nose.

Cinnamon, sage, wormwood, and anise. What other scents could have burnt a mark so deep in her memory?

He noticed that there were now tiny wrinkles at the corner of her eyes. He noticed some of her hair, now almost over her waist, had small split ends and looked light brown in the morning light.

He noticed every detail in every inch of changes. He noticed nothing in the end. Only her eyes, of eminent purple.

She knew what those eyes looked like; those metal eyes of eminent purple, glistened with sparks of gold, without any expression of emotion. She knew her eyes cannot tell what needed to be told. She had to say it. 

“You look so thin.” Finally she spoke, and almost burst into laughter, had not the scent of him made her throat tight.

Yes, it must be the scent. What else could it be?

_No tears?_ He smiled, no longer hiding his fangs. _I wonder what a horrific sight I must be right now. But I don’t have the strength to hide anymore; at least, not now_. The scent of her, although imperceptible to herself, was exceptionally strong to his nose. He inhaled deeply and felt dizzy.

It was the scent. What else could it be?

They stood there, lost in the dream of possibilities. When they finally realized they were awake, she reached out first. And they embraced.

A thousand voice resounded in the wind in a cacophony, they couldn’t find their own.

After some time – perhaps a very long time, or a very short time, nobody bothered to check the detail – she spoke. As if he had merely returned, not from life and death but a long stroll, carrying some berries found in deep woods.

“You are here.”

And he replied. As if he had never left.

“I am here.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It has been a great pleasure for me to write up this little story. It ended up longer than I expected, and the plot became something quite different from how I envisioned at the very beginning. I didn't think I could actually write this much in a relatively short period of time (ahem at least for me, a procrastinator and a newbie writer).
> 
> I know this is only fanfic, but it made me realize how much I loved and love writing and I cannot imagine my life without it. Ever since I wrote my first essay in first grade, reading and writing had been the passion of my life. But I didn't have the guts to claim that I want to write (not to mention wanting to be a writer). Worse yet, in middle school, I had a fallout with my then-best friend due to something related to fiction writing, and I stopped writing for non-academic reasons altogether since. This has been my first fiction in over 7 years. And I cannot express the joy I had felt when I did worldbuilding in my head; when I researched; when I laid down the drafts; when I continue to replenish my writing toolbox; when I negotiate with characters in my head to see where this was going. And of course, when I got kudos and comments <3 Thank. you. all. so. much. I wish I had more harsh critics tho (´°̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥ω°̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥｀)
> 
> I love the Witcher universe, all the characters from the books and the games, and this awesome fandom. A hearty thanks to whoever's reading this, and I hope this hasn't been a complete waste of your time:)
> 
> For those who also writes: keep at it and happy writing! ^^
> 
> UD: THIS WILL NOT BE THE END. I'm revising the previous chapters and will be writing more on B&W content soon.


	10. Come Live with Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Reuion. Is something beginning or is it ending?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> watcher: what Regis calls raven in B&W  
> eddy/eddies: currency in Cyberpunk 2077
> 
> Melodrama alert.  
> Oh and SMUT alert. Also the use of F word.  
> I would really have Rana swear a lot more and dirtier if not for the concern of making it too disturbing for readers lol also I'm not very comfortable with writing profanity yet. In truth, I think Rana would probably "swear like an old trooper" according to the witcher universe standard, given that she's from cyberpunk world. But maybe she just feels she doesn't want to scare Regis off? lol

> _I wish I could understand the window in your soul. Mine has none such, but I believe in others'._
> 
> _It is as though mine says to me,_ You alone are damned _. To you the daylight, to you the reality of what appears; for you the dead of Loc Muinne will be dead forever, the pain everywhere the overmastering reality, the skull beneath the skin, beneath the glad smile, in the snarling teeth. To you, the lone and level sands covering human endeavor, the ephemerality of laughter...... Only for others, the reality of human life, the game worthwhile as it is being played. Only for others, any kind of hope. Only for others, the window in the closed room—or closed night sky, it makes no difference.”_
> 
> ― Jacob Typpetre Jr., _Our Dreams Rose Up Forever_

“Don’t get up just yet.” Regis whispered. His hand reached for Rana as what probably was supposed to be a gentle tug at her waist, but he missed by an inch and landed on something else – his hand clasped quite conveniently and earned a soft squeal from her.

She turned back with one hand on her side, pretending to be angry, and he couldn’t help but smile, despite the lethargy brought on by the traveling yesterday and the disruption in his regeneration process, despite what had come to pass, despite even having dreamed of them last night.

How much had he missed her? _This_? To see the rays of morning light pouring through the window pane, into the little cottage, onto the bed, exposing her elusive shape under the linen shift. To wake up next to someone’s warmth, hers. To nuzzle his nose in the crook of her neck and breathe in her scent.

To believe, that icy terror and blackness gloomed to no end was in the past and that he really had come through the ordeal, now the burden on his conscience could be justly lessened for a fracture.

“I’m happy, Rana.” He said. The words came first, then the realization seeped through.

She looked at his eyes with a sudden jolt. He couldn’t decipher what those eyes meant to say. And he was surprised when he saw her slightly parted lips trembled.

“‘Rana.’” She said, her voice was a little unsteady, “It’s the first time you called me that.”

“Indeed? Egregious. From now on, I’ll be sure to call you so abundantly, you’d grow tired of my voice in no time.”

“I would never.”

She leaned down for a quick kiss, but when their lips met, she changed her idea. Her teeth tugged at his lower lip, and she sunk them in tight enough to get a low grumbling from his throat. It woke up the hunger inside of him, the hunger they did not have the energy to sate last night, just after their reunion. He pulled her down unexpectedly, she lost her balance and fell onto him. They both laughed. She rested her forehead against his, and looked into those intoxicating dark eyes.

“I want you, Regis.” She breathed out his name.

“And I you, Rana.”

And they did it. With haste, headily, madly, hungrily, and loudly. Fingers swam across sultry lips, lips across chest, taut nipples, then across the whole body that had been the subject of so many dreams in their time of parting. Taking everything in one push, buried to the hilt, bodies shaking, not wasting any time to speed up. They wanted so desperately to lose in the frantic rhythm, to let the wet heat consume them, to forget the world outside of their bodies still exist.

Feeling the knot in her stomach coiling tighter and tighter, Rana sat up while not losing the momentum and arched her back, dampness dripped from her center. She rolled her hips, ground savagely into him, with abandon and longing. For him, and for the incredible tremors she didn’t realize her body was starved for with zeal.

Soon – too soon – the friction between their bodies made her lose in the waves of motion, she gripped his length from within, feeling herself flutter around his hardness uncontrollably and came, hard. A soundless cry froze in her chest as her vision went black.

He pulsated with her, denoting his own release. Panting, she stilled and let him pull her hips down and crash into her, surrendering himself fully to his visceral instinct while her high lapped over her core. He groaned, nailed dug into her hips and she hissed, the pain somehow only made her want to bounce off him again. She leaned in, arms around his neck and shoulder, her tongue tumbled into his mouth. They groaned together, this time, into each other, feeling the humming vibrated through their bodies, sending quivers to the coupled center. 

When she was feeling another wave of pleasure threatening to take her over the edge again, she panted incoherent words into Regis’ ears, earning more tethering breaths from the vampire. But what he did next, was a complete surprise. To them both.

Head bowed into the curve of her neck, his kisses fell ceaselessly onto her chin, her neck, her shoulders, he burned with lust, for her, and for something else.

He nipped on her left shoulder, then the playfully tease became a sting as the tip of his sharp canine teeth punctured the skin effortlessly. She felt him shuddered underneath her, and went still.

To her surprise, she found herself only irritated by the pause in actions. His throbbing shaft inside her, his disheveled breath beside her ears, his mouth on her shoulder, shattered the little logic left in her brain. This pain should have alerted her, but instead it excited her even more. Nothing else mattered, only his presence, overpowering any sensibility of the flesh, commanded more and more.

She pressed herself down, embracing him with every part of her, her wound singed his lips, and the lips finally opened, resistance unsealed, gentle lapping turned to guzzling, and from her shoulder blood tickled down, no, flowed, into his eager mouth, escaping from the corner.

With a tight grunt, he heaved her up then down, pushing himself in completely. A warmth bloomed inside her. She closed her eyes and bit down her scream into his neck.

It’s very dark all around.

A cave. Quiet and peaceful. The perfect nest for her and her pack to roost during the day. Except that they have no access to the central chamber of the cave, deeper, darker, ideal for long and undisturbed slumbers. But they know better to stay away from it.

They know who dwells there. And they know he despises guests.

Right now She carries a message from _Him_. A very confusing message, yet she senses its unquestionable authority in it and made haste. 

She flies. Over the lake, over the meadows, over dark woodlands, over mills and cottages. _To the city_. She retains. _To the city. Find him_. 

She finds him. They find him. On a roof, in the moonlight, dark and foreboding.

Amidst the incessant shrieking of humans, flame dances in his cold blue eyes. He scowls and vanishes in a crimson mist.

They fly. Smelling the scent of smoke and blood rising from underneath.

Somewhere a bell tolls and tolls, like a frantic heart beating for survival.

Stenches of death spoil the air and she screeches, irritated. They all long to return to their slumber, where it’s devoid of the yelling of humans and the menace of fire, where it’s moist and peace glooms.

So they fly. Away, from the chaos raging in this human habitant.

Rana came to with a headache.

She was not in a cave, nor was she flying in the night over some burning city. She sat up on the cot and looked at the bookshelves in Regis’ summer cottage. Sunlight shot through the window, the angle of the light on the shelves indicated that some time has passed since she tried to get up and was caught by Regis. The air around was warm, heavy with the scent of sex and…

Blood?

Right. That. She struggled to get up and felt her entire left arm shaky with effort.

“You wake! At last.”

She was genuinely startled by Regis’ voice. The vampire almost never raises his voice unless it’s absolutely necessary, and his longevity meant he was not easily surprised by just anything. What happened to her? She tried to remember.

She did, and felt a flush flourished in her center, but still not sure why Regis seemed distressed. He sat on a stool beside the cot with his head lowered, hands clasped tight.

_Was he tired?_ She grinned knowingly. “That was _something_. Wasn’t it?”

Regis didn’t look at her, didn’t see her smile. He shut his eyes and groaned into his hands. She saw his shoulders trembling.

“What’s wrong?” She asked, putting a hand on his head and ran her fingers through his gray hair gently. _He has gone through much and some damage never heals._ She could feel it in him; also see it with her eyes.

Regis remained silent for some time. Then he pulled himself up and looked into her eyes. She was alarmed by what she saw.

“Me. I’m all that’s wrong.” He stood up, a little shakily, and moved a few steps away. “I abused your trust. I abused blood. Damn it! I drank _your blood._ In the moment of our intimacy... There’s something wrong with me, Rana. I made a resolution never to break it, yet I did. And as if my death wasn’t enough to remind me, I, did it again. It only worsened the addiction. I cannot be trusted. I wouldn’t even trust myself.”

He looked at her.

“You should leave. I will send _watchers_ to make sure you are safe until you reach a city. You would be safer behind some heavy walls. With people. Not a _monster_.”

“What?” She leaped out of bed, not caring about the fact that she was naked.

“Don't ever use that word.” She said, throwing every syllabus at him. “So you got a little carried away, so you drank some blood. Did I scream? No. Did I even try to stop you? No. Am I still breathing? Yes. So what’s the deal? It’s happened, and I'm telling you it's insignificant. It. just. happened. It doesn’t make you anything more than what you already are.”

He clenched his jaw hearing the last sentence, and turned his head away.

“Please? Stop brooding and spoiling the day. We just got back together.” She added, in a softer tone. “Besides, if you are even bothered with how I feel, it had only added to the sensations; at least at the moment.”

He lifted his head and looked at her, his doleful black eyes looked almost like a perfect hematite crystal, if not for the slight spoil of effect of the bloodshot.

“I _am_ bothered with how you feel, which is why I think you shouldn’t be around me. The evidence is stacking up to prove that you are not safe in my presence. If – ”

“There is no if.” She interrupted, impatient to get this over with. “Right now, I am alive, despite everything. To me, that’s enough evidence of you being capable of controlling yourself.”

Wanting to end the argument more effectively, she closed the distance between them in two strides and hugged him, he wriggled at her touch but eventually let her.

“I’m surprised to think we never had the conversation about, you know. How do you say it? ‘Hemoglobin’.” She chuckled. “We should have. If we did, you wouldn’t be this upset right now. You would know,”

She pulled back slightly to look at him. 

“You would know I’d never mind.”

He bored into her eyes, after a while, he spoke.

“I… thank you, for trusting me, if only somewhat blindly.” He sighed. “I am touched by your sincerity, Rana, for your… _willingness_ if after seeing my... other side. Twice. But I don’t know how I can justify myself of risking your life. You are alive, by the grace of gods, if there were any; and you say that’s enough evidence of my self-control? To me, that’s exactly the lack of evidence. What am I waiting for? The next accident? Recovering from my bloodlust only to find your cold corpse with my bitemark on your neck? Forgive the language, but I have to say it, for it is exactly what plagues my mind. I tried to deny it, but I can’t. I can’t gamble with your life, I can’t bear the burden of having your life on my—Do you understand?”

Rana didn’t say anything.

“Please.” Regis gritted his teeth. “Please don’t make me. Don’t make me reveal more details of my ‘inhumanity’. Even as we are speaking now, do you know how my throat burns with every whiff of your blood coming from the wound? Do you hear the voice in my head that’s been urging my hands to squeeze around your neck and crush your fragile, human life?”

“No, I don’t. But— ”

“Then there is no ‘but’. I’m sorry, Rana. If you know not, you know not. And I’m afraid you will never be able to truly understand. Too much differs us.” His voice grew icy cold at the last sentence, and she felt as though a tiny shard of ice was lodged right in her chest.

“No! _Not enough_ differs us.” She shouted back. “Not enough for you to take care of a patient without asking for payment, not enough for you to save an innocent girl from being burned at stake, not enough for you to risk your life for some other fragile, human lives. Nor is it enough for us to mourn for our fallen friends, together, just last night. And certainly not enough for me to care about you. All of you. Not just your grace, your experience, your wondering philosophical mind, but also your greying hair, your fangs, your sometimes condescending tone of voice.”

“I never intend my speech to be condescending. I want them to be efficient.” Regis interrupted, fighting against the ache tightening his throat.

“Understand, I am not the ‘dark handsome stranger’ to sweep your away from your—prosaic—life. I am not the embodiment of some eroticism, of which a dangerous predator somehow always manages to overcome his weakness in the face of his _one true love_. Maybe he does, in some other stories, some other worlds; but in this one, I know I can’t be sure if anything can stop me when the bloodthirst arises.”

“You are not a fetish, nor a way out of a **_boring_** life human. Yes, boring, that’s the word you wanted to use, wasn’t it? My short, ignorant, boring, human life.” Rana said, not hiding the sarcasm.

“How can I, a human, who only live out at most one-tenth of your lifespan, possibly know the burden of having to carry the death of someone you love? Because for sure **_my_** brain had already forgotten the image of **_my_** brother’s body lying in front of me, **_my_** inefficient human brain wouldn’t be able to remember the unnatural angle his neck twisted to, how the blood and urine stank at the scene, the gores smeared his chest and the ground, even though the police covered his middle, which was crushed by two cars in breakneck speed. He didn't have had a chance to run away; he probably didn’t even realize what’s happening before he was dead.”

She stopped, suddenly feeling very sick. She held onto Regis. Somehow the bombarding and retaliation of words have not broken them from the half-hearted embrace yet.

“How could I know what it is like to lose someone you love? Even if that loved one died because of you? Even if he was only at that place at that time to get you back to school, where you should have been but weren’t. Because you were bored with your boring life. Because you wanted to run with people who promised an exciting life with _eddies_ and actions. With power, over other people’s lives, over your own life, which you did not have because your mom couldn’t hold any job because she’s always high.”

Nobody said anything for a long time.

“Really, what the fuck can I possibly understand?” Rana finally muttered.

She looked at Regis – she could not look at him enough today; because of the separation, and especially because of the fight. She wanted, not caring if she could, to understand him, to _see_ him.

He was unsure and wanted to dart his gaze away, but she didn’t let him.

She said. “I have loved and lost. So I decided it’s better to not love than having to lose it again. I lived in the safety of indifference until I came here. I met people who helped me without expecting anything in return, and I so wanted to do something in return. But I didn’t; not in the way I should. I should have died with my comrades in Stygga. Instead, I live. Can you understand why? Why did I, with my free will, made the lesser choice? To live, not to try and make a difference, because it could jeopardize my own life. Without questions, I followed the easier path. Do you know how I feel? Regis? Who lived so long and knows so much? Everyone is a slave to something, at some time or another. Me, too.”

“But right now," She continued, her voice changed, "I want to make this work. In fact, I want it so bad that I really don’t care if I end up dead. What was it Dandelion said? A coward dies a thousand times but the valiant taste of death but once? So grant me this wish, even if it’s selfish; let me live first. With you.”

Regis didn’t say anyting, but his eyes said a great deal. He gently tugged one arm at her side, and tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear.

“Are you sure?” He asked after a long time.

 _Don’t you know? Don’t you already know?_ She smiled.

“Regis. I don’t know what is ‘love.’ But if it is wanting to be with, if it is feeling comfortable without any pretense or disguise, if it is the desire, resolution and hope that we will pull through, despite our differences, then, I love you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The opening quote is a rewording of one of my favorite quote from the wonderful [James Tiptree Jr](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Tiptree_Jr.). Her fanficalterego Jacob Typpetre Jr. would be a character very closely *related to my OC here;)  
> The quote from Dandelion is a quote from Shakespeare.


	11. "Austere"- a small Domestic

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Regis faces one of the trickiest questions as a vampire partner ;)

"Regis?"

"Hmm?"

"What do I taste like? No, not there! Take your claws away or be sure that you have to finish what you started..."

"Hardly a punishment..."

"You are terrible... But I was asking you a question. So, what's my blood taste like to you?"

Silence. A sigh.

"Unique."

"That's it? Only one word? From the great lecturer? So unlike you. Are you hiding something? Tell me, is it that I don't taste good? I promise, your demijohn won't be upset if her quality is left to be desired."

Laughter. Another sigh. 

"Ah, my dear Rana. No, it was good, and again, thank you. But if I'm to be entirely candid, it's a little too strong to my taste, yes. There's something in your blood--I'm not sure if I know the composition--that leaves a bitter aftertaste.

"How am I not surirpsed. You wouldn't be either if you've seen my diet before I came here. But enought of the past."

"Regis."

"Yes?"

"I prefer it not to be a regular activity; but I want to let you know... You can ask if you want more --"

"--I also, want you to know that. And I want to let you know that I would never ask you. Treat it as a new resolution."

"Is it really necessary?"

"It is."

"And you won't miss --"

"Once is enough for me."

"Really?"

"I have a good memory."


	12. Onward

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "To make an end is to make an beginning"

“I noticed you’ve turned the little fountain into a hatchery for weatherfish and sliverbeams.”

Said Regis, peeling off potato skins with the dexterous fingers of a doctor. In front of him, two small shallow bowls, one filled with chopped carrots, the other with round-shaped, ivory-colored potatoes even smaller than the bowl—one had to admit, when it came to gardening, or growing things in general, Rana wasn’t the best. But it will serve a decent meal to both nonetheless. 

Rana was grilling said fish over the only the pan, preparing to transfer it to a pot for broth later.

She was sick of fish, potatoes, and carrots after eating it every day for three months, but grew used to it the fourth month, and has already settled on the diet, occasionally accompanied by mushrooms she gathered in the forest clearing. She made do, thanks to the variety of spices and dry herbs left in Regis’ little cottage.

“I have to eat something—” She flipped the second fish over, took the pan off the fire and hurled the round-belly pot that’s heavy with water onto the stove. “—and I’m not good at hunting.”

“Justly so, justly so.” Regis smiled. “You are not worried about the degradation of drinking water quality?”

“Well,” Rana replied, now turned around and was looking a little sheepishly at him, “I also turned your moonshine equipment into a water distiller.”

This time, Regis laughed, throatily. “I humbly bow down before your survival skills, Rana my dear. I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised that you knew not only the importance and how-to on sterilizing water. I am full of admiration.”

“Ah, now you are making fun of me.”

“I dare not!” Regis pretended to be wronged and feigned an innocent expression. He has finished dealing with the vegetables, now wiping his hands over the apron.

 _Short hair and muttonchops suit him._ Rana thought as she sat down in the only chair in the room and looked at him. _Busying himself with peeling off vegetable skins suits him too, as much as entertaining noblewomen in court, dressed in black velvet. But which one do I like better?_

Her thoughts ended with a question, one she had no intention to answer it then; there was no reason to hurry. They had just met again, confessed their feelings, and now everything was the same. Same, but also a little different.

Since yesterday’s “quarrel,” which, with her silent but determined insistence— a warm, tender, unclothed insistence—ended under the sheets. No one asked anything after that, but they talked a great deal, of everything. Since then, it had seemed to them that time passed on just a tad faster and the world started to exist in a richer and brighter tone.

Or maybe it was the spring.

Regis had told Rana about the plan to help Dettlaff, an enigma without whom Regis wouldn’t be here today. She already decided not to let anything get in the way of a friendship: if someone helped Regis, she shall think of the individual as important as any of her hanse comrades.

 _Aen hanse_ … Rana sighed and shook off a strange foreboding. Something to do with a dream she couldn’t remember very well now. 

“Regis.” She asked, going back to check on the water, “When we reach Nazair… Are you sure Dettlaff would agree to my company? You said he shuns the presence of human as a general rule.”

Regis walked up to her and leaned his shoulder against hers.

“As you said, ‘a general rule.’ Dettlaff was not particularly interested in human cultures and he thought he’d better spend his time working on his crafts than to study them. Until he met his Rhena, at least.” He stroked her hair on the shoulder gently and kissed her. She smiled, feeling the kiss on her head, but did not turn.

“Because of that,” Regis continued. “He lacks tactics in counteracting – let’s say – some unpleasant situations; unpleasant to most humans too I imagine, but especially repulsive and perplexing to us vampires. I have told you that the differences of our physiology made it so that our cultures differ quite a lot. For example, female vampires are the deciding factor of whether a pregnancy would take hold, and in most cases, we form monogamous bonds at least until the offspring are full-grown. In our society, there was no precedence of females being held as if captives of the household merely to breed; we don’t “marry” to secure financial or political ties, nor do we exact violence towards members of our pack, or, “family.” These behaviors are repugnant to us, you understand.”

“Same.” Rana muttered.

“However, the most common obstacle when communicating with humans was the game of deception.” Regis wrinkled his nose slightly. Rana wasn’t sure if it’s the smell of fish broth, or because of a sudden repulsion from his memory.

Regis continued. “We have to hide our true nature with most humans, to survive. But we discover that, with humans, most do it for reasons trivial beyond imagination and some do it for seemingly no reason at all. It is tiring and, irritating at times, having to constantly guess if what you say is truly what you mean.” He shook his head. “It took me time and effort to learn of this. And I had help, from an elder of my kind. I came to an understanding and even took pity on your condition, for I saw what causes the phenomena, what we think as no good reason could be, in your understanding, a matter of life and death; sometimes true, mostly due to misinformation and stupidity. But Dettlaff…… Well, Dettlaff is less patient when it comes to information being withheld from him, with or without a good reason. He thinks most humans play with fire and would be consumed by it before, his words, ‘their little moths’ brains can comprehend why’ –”

“So your point is?” Rana interrupted. “The food is almost ready and your argument ran off the first chance it got, as usual.”

They smiled. They were both used to it now; the rambling and the snark.

“Don’t rush me, my dear.” Regis reprimanded, not hiding a smirk at his lips. “For impatience often finds itself walking towards the wrong direction and in the company of dissatisfaction.”

“For me, it’s dissatisfaction drives impatience.” Not hiding her own smirk, Rana looked at Regis meaningfully and bit her lip in the most coquettish way she could picture, earning the vampire another laugh.

When Regis’ face fell back to its usual composure, those dark pools of obsidian locked into her eyes and he closed in on her, metaphorically and literally.

She let him, feeling her heart making its small leaps out of excitement and expectation as the little distance between their bodies disappeared; out of desire and out of happiness.

 _It feels wonderful to be in love._ She realized. _And I am. Right now. I did not think I could._

So she told Regis as their lips caressed each other at the moment before a promising tempest, one that would inspire awe, towards the nature of nature.

“Thank you.”

Someone murmured. The other responded with a long, drawn-in kiss. Their limbs suddenly found themselves to be entangled, fingers in strands of hair, touching, tugging; arms joined arms cross-ways, exploring beyond the sides, above the back—and below. Their legs were too close yet inconveniently could not be closer, unless someone’s thigh was lifted up around someone’s waist.

He pressed on closer and she noticed the thickening in his groin. She looked up—he wanted her to notice; that grin was all too telling. Those dangerously dark eyes gleamed, pleased with himself. She responded with a decisive move of her hips.

And they kissed again, this time the kiss was somewhat messy, befuddled by the quickened breathing wild with want.

However, they had to end with that kiss, even though impatience almost got the better of them.

At the sizzling sound of boiling broth rising and spilling over the pot, Rana disengaged unwillingly and ruefully, but not wanting to waste the meal, nor to burn down the cottage. She went to take the pot off the stove, after Regis left a small kiss on her neck, refusing to release her without an evil tease and a smirk on his face.

The suddenly aroused state made her feel like the content inside that pot, steaming and sweltering.

_But they should eat. And talk. There’s more time for it later, when they arrive at an inn in a city, with a more comfortable bed. Right now there were details to discuss._

And information to disclose.

Rana cleared her throat. “Let’s eat and continue our conversation. Afterward, I have something to tell you.”

***

Rana had to sit on the bed while Regis sat in the single chair in this extremely single cottage.

Rana was, and supposed to be, happy with the fact that they were planning on leaving the next morning or so. She could get used to living in the hermit’s little hut, to wait for him, a possibility; but to love it? She thought probably never. She’s too used to living among crowds and being able to meet most of the necessities without having to tend the details herself. She’d rather return to Toussaint, or to live in another city. But at the same time, she’s also feeling uneasy to leave.

Regis had explained to her the bond between him and this other vampire, Dettlaff. Blood tied or not, they have known each other for too long to leave the other in dismay; and according to Regis, Dettlaff was just in such a situation that called for care and aid from him, he wished to return to Dettlaff and begin the search for Dettlaff’s human lover as soon as possible.

Rana had thought of plans for the “afterward”: living a peaceful life, for one; and for a second, getting in touch with Dandelion and Geralt, through him, possibly Ciri as well. She’d love to meet the girl again.

She also felt that it’s their rights to know another member of their _hanse_ had made it, after the heartwrenching finale.

She had thought many possible scenarios, none involving yet another mission in search of a “damsel in distress.” In fact, she was not happy with the prospect, after having the other mission ended with deaths of friends.

The scars remained and occasionally plagued her dreams. She knew it also plagued Regis, only not in dreams—if he dreams—but in his waking hours. It’s written on his face; when he thought she wasn’t watching. He didn’t know she always did. Where else would she direct her eyes to? What other reason tied her to this place?

“So,” Rana began, stirring the hot soup with a spoon. “We leave tomorrow? To where again?”

“Nazair, then to Metinna.” Regis sat his bowl on the floor. “Rana, I know this might not be what you were planning, but Dettlaff needs aid and I cannot—would not—even think to refuse… I cannot guarantee it would be an easy task to find his human companion, however, I can guarantee that once it’s finished, we will find a place and—”

“Don’t,” Interrupted Rana, “there’s no need to elaborate.” She squeezed a smile and forced herself to look at him, “I didn’t really plan anything. I’m just happy that you are alive.” She lied. “And of course you have to help him. What are friends if we don’t help when they are in need?” A shadow of guilt shot through. This time, Regis caught the change of her tone.

“Let bygones be bygones, Rana.” He prodded on softly and picked up his bowl. “Best eat before the soup gone cold. Have you the heart to waste all that toil I put in peeling the vegetables?”

Rana smiled. She had missed this. How he could point out the fireflies and the purpletop Verbenas in a graveyard while making her forget the bones.

They ate, in peace and silence. Neither had shared a meal with another for so long.

***

It rained overnight. When Rana woke up, she saw a fully clothed Regis standing in front of the window.

Regis was worried if the rain had worsened the road condition and in turn delay their departure. But it turned out the rain had been sprinkles and as soon as the sun came out, the only trace of rain left was the fresh earthy scent in the air. That, alongside with the sight of wildflowers and tree leaves glimmering with dew, greatly inspired their mood.

Their plan was to reach Kernow by the end of the day, then proceed to Dillingen for horses and supplies.

Initially, they discussed the possibility of traveling _by_ Regis; in his giant bat form.

Regis first expressed his concern for Rana, anticipating her to be troubled by vertigo, if not worse. She laughed it off, genuinely, forgot that acrophobia was really a thing in medieval times.

The real reason they abandoned the possibility was the state Regis was in, after having his physical form back no longer than a year ago. It’d be hardly a problem for Rana, she co-piloted often on missions and maintained a golden record on her aviator certificate for two years straight.

Those became a few more unimportant things she promised to explain later. Now, as the small cottage was barely in sight, she decided she couldn’t postpone it any longer.

If bygones were to be bygones, she wished to do it as further away from where they’re going as possible.

***

“Regis,” She stopped by a tree. “There is one thing from my ‘past’ I never promised to tell; I think I should. I wanted to convince myself that it’s unimportant, but the fact that I kept it to myself for so long perhaps says something about that. ”

Regis leaned against the tree, his eyes glinted in the shadow of the leaves. For a second, Rana thought he was going to say something witty and not very tactful, but he ultimately controlled the words, only a small grin remained on his face, whatever he conjured up in his head to amuse himself.

“My ears are cocked.”

She sighed. “I hope your humor remains after hearing what I have to say.” She looked at him, even though it’s impossible to convey emotion from her eyes, she wanted to make up for the procedure before an honest confession.

“I’m not… Before I came to this place, I had another name. When Geralt asked my name, I didn’t know what to do and words just came to my head, so I told her I’m ‘Rana, Nyanya, Ambarmetta.’ I think nobody remembered the whole thing besides Dandelion, but that doesn’t matter.” A smiled appeared, very faintly and very briefly.

“It’s actually a fictional language, from this book I really liked when I was little. It means ‘traveler from another world.’ _Rana_ means _wanderer_.”

“Has the wanderer reached her destination here in the other-world?” asked Regis. His obsidian eyes were dark and welcoming.

“She has a feeling that wherever she’s at, is not the end yet. But now she has an aim.” Rana smiled. “Let’s go.”

“Do you want to know the name given to me by someone I no longer cares?” She asked cautiously after they resumed walking.

“Only if you want to share. Names do entail abundant information, but in our case, I’m confident to say that what I know is enough to cast titles aside. Whatever you go by, I know you.”

She touched his fingers. Cold. Warm enough for her. She squeezed his hand softly, her fingers hugging his.

“And so,” said Regis, his brows knitted in pensive thoughts. “Now we welcome a new journey, a new destination, full of possibilities that have never been.”

“Couldn’t have put it _any_ _better_.”

They walked on.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this part of the story has finally come to a close! I'm fery fery happy to finish it haha, considering the chaotic structure and the lack of plotting. Phew, but with or without a goal, I hope the fluff (and smut) made up for it.  
> Thank you for reading, and, if you are interested, a second part is being written called _[The Memory of Vines](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18028721)_ , set during & after Blood and Wine content:3


End file.
